There has been huge changes in televisions and television programming in my life. I can remember as a small child watching television with my family. in those days people actually did that. The whole family would gather in one room, what everybody called the "TV room" and watch television together. It was actually a family time. Family shows were the big thing too. We would sit and watch the Ed Sullivan Show or Jackie Gleason. For us as kids there were some decent shows too. Many is the day I spent in front of the tube watching The Lone Ranger, Johnnie's Follies. Going back even farther I can remember watching Romper Room with Miss Linda and her magic Mirror that looked out through the television set and actually allowed her to see us in our living rooms. I waved back at her like an idiot.
As we got older the shows changed. I would watch I Spy and Mission Impossible. Star Trek and the like were just too good to be true.
If anything, the evolution in technology is even more remarkable. We spent our time glued to the small black and white television sets with no concept of what was in store for us down the road. Our neighbors got a color television set and we were just amazed at such a thing. The first remote control television was another major wonder; the idea that you could sit in your chair and change channels without getting up was just phenomenal.
The number of television stations is another huge difference. I was lucky enough to live in a moderately sized city and we had three whole stations to choose from. The advent of UHF programming in New Orleans tickled us to death. Another station!
Nowadays we have color, high definition, flat screen, big screen, and everything in between. The image quality is unbelievable compared to what we grew up with. Having witnessed the progress made in television over my short lifetime I can only guess at what lies ahead of us. The idea that three dimensional images being broadcast into our living rooms is certainly not a stretch by any means, and the technology to make television interactive is already here. It's going to an interesting time over the next twenty years as television reaches deeper into our lives.