To understand whether or not you can survive without pay television, look at three important criteria: study what you watch, how often you watch it, and whether what you watch is satisfying or merely white noise. I performed this survey on myself, and organized my viewing habits under the following broad categories:
- Entertainment TV (action, comedy, drama, talk shows, etc): 2 hours per day
- News and Documentary TV: 60 minutes per day
- Sports TV: 30 minutes per day
A great way to start is to list everything you watched this week and last. Even if you 'TiVo-ed' through the commercials, add 5 minutes to each show. Then, place your viewing into the above categories, and add new ones when a show goes outside the categories. The idea is to get a birds-eye view of your viewing habits.
Mine shocked me - I couldn't believe how many hours I wasted watching television! I guess I wanted to get the most out of my cable, which is more expensive this year than last. Talk about wasting my time!
OK, Steps One and Two in my criteria completed!
Now to the third criteria - this one is much more difficult. How do you place value on a service, when any opinion derived is based more on emotion than hard scientific fact? "I think it brings me value" is not good enough! You must decide how valuable that entertainment is, and balance it against your financial resources and time available to watch pay television. Can you 'survive' without pay television? OF COURSE YOU CAN! Perhaps a better question is, "Where will I seek my entertainment if pay television doesn't exist?"
Stay tuned for my answers - they're sure to surprise. Until then, follow my lead: BEGIN THE BREAK!!
- Entertainment TV (action, comedy, drama, talk shows, etc): 2 hours per day
- News and Documentary TV: 60 minutes per day
- Sports TV: 30 minutes per day
A great way to start is to list everything you watched this week and last. Even if you 'TiVo-ed' through the commercials, add 5 minutes to each show. Then, place your viewing into the above categories, and add new ones when a show goes outside the categories. The idea is to get a birds-eye view of your viewing habits.
Mine shocked me - I couldn't believe how many hours I wasted watching television! I guess I wanted to get the most out of my cable, which is more expensive this year than last. Talk about wasting my time!
OK, Steps One and Two in my criteria completed!
Now to the third criteria - this one is much more difficult. How do you place value on a service, when any opinion derived is based more on emotion than hard scientific fact? "I think it brings me value" is not good enough! You must decide how valuable that entertainment is, and balance it against your financial resources and time available to watch pay television. Can you 'survive' without pay television? OF COURSE YOU CAN! Perhaps a better question is, "Where will I seek my entertainment if pay television doesn't exist?"
Stay tuned for my answers - they're sure to surprise. Until then, follow my lead: BEGIN THE BREAK!!
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