this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2023
9 points (100.0% liked)
Mildly Infuriating
35472 readers
321 users here now
Home to all things "Mildly Infuriating" Not infuriating, not enraging. Mildly Infuriating. All posts should reflect that.
I want my day mildly ruined, not completely ruined. Please remember to refrain from reposting old content. If you post a post from reddit it is good practice to include a link and credit the OP. I'm not about stealing content!
It's just good to get something in this website for casual viewing whilst refreshing original content is added overtime.
Rules:
1. Be Respectful
Refrain from using harmful language pertaining to a protected characteristic: e.g. race, gender, sexuality, disability or religion.
Refrain from being argumentative when responding or commenting to posts/replies. Personal attacks are not welcome here.
...
2. No Illegal Content
Content that violates the law. Any post/comment found to be in breach of common law will be removed and given to the authorities if required.
That means: -No promoting violence/threats against any individuals
-No CSA content or Revenge Porn
-No sharing private/personal information (Doxxing)
...
3. No Spam
Posting the same post, no matter the intent is against the rules.
-If you have posted content, please refrain from re-posting said content within this community.
-Do not spam posts with intent to harass, annoy, bully, advertise, scam or harm this community.
-No posting Scams/Advertisements/Phishing Links/IP Grabbers
-No Bots, Bots will be banned from the community.
...
4. No Porn/Explicit
Content
-Do not post explicit content. Lemmy.World is not the instance for NSFW content.
-Do not post Gore or Shock Content.
...
5. No Enciting Harassment,
Brigading, Doxxing or Witch Hunts
-Do not Brigade other Communities
-No calls to action against other communities/users within Lemmy or outside of Lemmy.
-No Witch Hunts against users/communities.
-No content that harasses members within or outside of the community.
...
6. NSFW should be behind NSFW tags.
-Content that is NSFW should be behind NSFW tags.
-Content that might be distressing should be kept behind NSFW tags.
...
7. Content should match the theme of this community.
-Content should be Mildly infuriating.
-At this time we permit content that is infuriating until an infuriating community is made available.
...
8. Reposting of Reddit content is permitted, try to credit the OC.
-Please consider crediting the OC when reposting content. A name of the user or a link to the original post is sufficient.
...
...
Also check out:
Partnered Communities:
Reach out to LillianVS for inclusion on the sidebar.
All communities included on the sidebar are to be made in compliance with the instance rules.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I’m old enough to remember when HBO’s entire point was you paid for cable so you wouldn’t have ads. That was their business model.
Then sometime in the late 80s or early 90s (I dunno, that decade’s kind of a blur) they started sneaking ads in between shows, but not in the middle of shows. But you were paying a higher price, with a few ads. Then they started showing ads to everyone, and still making you pay. I’m still salty about that.
This was always going to happen. They’ll compound paying PLUS ads, and you’ll like it, because what choice do you have if all services are doing it?
Fuck them all . 🏴☠️
e: massively borked that first sentence
Most cable TV channels still had ads, the revenue generated from subscribers would never have been enough to cover otherwise.
Edit: thanks for the downvotes, I'm right, they're wrong, deal with it: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/s/7wxRbKq9Dj
In the early days they didn’t; that was the whole point of them. You paid a subscription specifically not to have ads like free broadcast television did.
It only lasted like a decade, but it was their whole selling point.
e: keep in mind, too, that broadcast tv at the time was where all the good content was. HBO only showed movies that had already been in theatres (thus the name Home Box Office) and Showtime’s hook was soft-core porn. (‘Do your parents have Showtime?’ was sleepover code for ‘can we watch kinda-porn after the ‘rents have gone to sleep?’) There wasn’t the dearth of original shows/movies we have now. They weren’t studios back then.
e2: sorry for multiple edits, but also bear in mind that when HBO first came out, people were watching their content on televisions like this, which was so inferior to movie theatres that ‘it’s in your home advertising free!’ was basically their whole selling point at first.
That's a false belief that keeps getting spread, cable TV started as the same channels with clear reception instead of having to rely on antennas, so no people didn't pay not to have ads, they paid to be able to have a good reception of the same channels then had access to for free with bad reception, then some exclusive channels started appearing without commercials, but it wasn't the norm.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/s/7wxRbKq9Dj
And it's funny that you're talking about "the early days" since it started in 1948 and I'm willing to bet that you weren't born.
I mean, I’m not going off a belief, I actually lived this.
Yes, the clear reception vs bunny ears was awesome, but that was also limited on televisions like this, and I’m talking specifically about the content.
My family were always early adopters of technology (I started gaming in ‘79 with both the Intellivision and Atari – Intellivision was far superior). We had HBO, Cinemax, and Showtime as soon as they were available.
I’m talking about the late 70s and early 80s when they were commercially available to the masses and the cable wars began.
The late 70s were absolutely the early days of commercial cable tv.
deleted by creator
The late 70s were absolutely the early days of commercial cable tv.I provided a source with more sources, no it wasn't.
Need more? There:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cable_television_in_the_United_States
First phrase:
Cable television first became available in the United States in 1948.The majority of channels has commercials, the ones you paid extra for (like HBO) didn't, they weren't the majority and the point of paying for cable wasn't too remove ads, you still had them on the majority of the channels because they were the same as what you got with antennas.
You're not the only one who lived it buddy, you just don't remember it properly.
How old are you?
I don’t need links to tell me what this was like when I vividly remember.
Yea, cable television first became available in 1948. Regular middle class families did not have cable television for a long time after that.
Mobile phone service was available in 1959. Guess how many people had it? A good friend of my family had a car phone in the mid 70s. Guess how common that was?
You can’t go by invention dates on stuff like this. You’ll be amazed at how long some things take to gain market acceptance.
So far I'm the only one providing sources, an anecdote of when you were a kid isn't reliable.
The majority of channels had ads because, again, they were just the same channels as without cable. Cable exclusive channels weren't a thing before 1970 (when there's was 10m subscribers already) and ads on a cable exclusive channel first started in 1977 with nearly all of them having ads in the in the 80s.
7 years of commercial free cable exclusive channels that were a minority of channels available at the time. No, people weren't paying not to see adverts and no it wasn't the point of cable TV like you said, the point of creating cable TV was to allow people to reliably watch TV by broadcasting the signal in a way that wasn't affected by all sorts of elements out of the control of the broadcasters.
Why are you so bent about this?
Again, how old are you? Do you actually remember this time? I gave one anecdote, but ask literally anyone my age and they’ll say the same. You certainly know people my age, don’t take my word for it, ask them what sleepovers were like before and after cable tv became a thing. Everyone my age remembers a massive shift, especially with Showtime.
With/without cable wasn’t an easy change. Lots of people didn’t accept it easily because it seemed technically complex. That’s part of why my family was an early adopter: my dad was an aerospace engineer, so it was a no-brainier.
The televisions sold in the late 70s were not set up for cable, so you needed a cable box and to configure your tv a certain way – typically by setting one of your two dials to channel 2, 4, or I think UHF 12 (?it’s been a while, but it depended on your tv, and you’d have an auxiliary dongle, too), you had to plug a cable box into your tv (which was nowhere near as simple as now), and then maybe sacrifice a goat. I joke, but the wiring out of the back of those things wasn’t easy. It wasn’t clear ports with matching inputs, but more like in the back of old school audio speakers, but more of them.
That doesn’t sound hard, but for most people the tv was a magic box that pictures came out of. These were your grandparents, they weren’t good at technology.
In the late 80s, yeah. That’s after what I’m talking about. It sounds like you’re talking about the era of Nickelodeon and the height of Showtime/Cinemax porn. I’m talking about more than a decade before that.
Yes, by that point, cable had settled into the subscription + ad model I’m saying was the down slide. I’m talking about way before that, when it hadn’t yet devolved.
Again, I’m not making this up, and I kinda wonder what you think my motivation would be to do so, but I’m very curious how old you are and if you’re just going on things you’ve read or if you were alive for this.
e: clarification
deleted by creator
I was a weird nerd, and some of my fondest memories are helping my dad do engine work on our wood-sided station wagon (I was such a cliché) and going with him to the tv shop to pick up vacuum tubes for the tv after a loud pop and faint waft of smoke, then shimmying ass-upwards on the wall like spider man to hold the flashlight at the correct angle whilst my dad pulled the particle-board (I think, maybe cardboard) back off the television and taught me what every single part inside did.
Best time of my young life, hands down.
e: I’ve never been afraid of technology or learning things in my adult life. Thanks, dad.
(And if you’re raising your child like this, thank you. You’re helping to make good people that way.)
deleted by creator
Oh yeah! Exactly! Mine was very similar to this, but a bit narrower. It was a behemoth, plus the cord was very short.
Thus the shimmying ass-upwards to hold the torch. There was scant space back there, and making more was work.
I think you’re right. It was a dark, dense, and very thick board, but not actual wood. I had a radio or clock or something with the same backing, now you mention it. I hadn’t paid much attention except it was thicker than the ikea shit, lol.
Wait, what? I completely missed that growing up.
Brb.
deleted by creator
BTW, I think your detractor is probably too scared to take me onYou sound just like a COVID denier, hope you realise that? "My experience is true, people who researched the subject and found sources from those in the industry are wrong. Let me show you with anecdotes instead of sources to back my point!"
deleted by creator
Christ on a bike, don’t say shit like that to me – my house was built in 1886. O.o
Just keeps getting worse from there. Some outlets in this place have seen all the world wars.
There are more efficient ways to give me a heart attack, you know.
I think you’re right. I was sticking around for the next volley of meme-facts, but it looks like the match has been called. :)
deleted by creator