We all have our procrastination techniques. But most of us share one in common: Television.
It’s always there, sending out subconscious messages to you from that spot across from the sofa: “Just a half an hour of The Simpsons. You know you want to. Just a few minutes of the game. Maybe Bonds will get beaned by a pitcher. Come on, you know you want to.”
We got rid of our TV in May. The timing was good. We were moving. The HDTV transition is coming next year, our TV was big and bulky, and I was in no mood to haul it yet again. So we gave the TV away. I signed us up for cable Internet access, but no cable TV (which seemed odd to the Comcast people).
We continue to receive Netflix so we can watch movies and HBO shows. We buy TV shows and movies on iTunes. We watch the occasional YouTube video, and I watch FORA.tv from time to time.
Advantages
- I spend less money than I would with a cable TV plan (I don’t download pirated content either).
- I watch less TV, because for me watching video on my PowerBook requires more of a mental commitment. The extra few seconds it takes to pop in the DVD or fire up iTunes gives me enough pause to consider what I’m doing.
- I watch what I want to watch, rather than what is simply on at the time. We had Tivo before we ditched the TV, and I almost never watched live TV. Even then, Tivo was really good at finding things I’d want to watch (The History Channel, for example). With the laptop approach, I can watch the few things I intend to watch, and not much else.
- I eat less while watching. I’m cautious with food around my laptop. I’m not cautious about food when I’m sitting in front of the TV.
Disadvantages
- Live sports may have been the real reason the television was invented. It certainly wasn’t the reason laptops were developed. I long ago gave up on most sports-watching on TV, because I realized I wasn’t actually getting much out of it. But I realize I’m a bit out of the law school mainstream in this regard.
- A 15″ monitor is spacious for a laptop, but some movies scream out for a bigger screen. This is actually less of an issue than I thought it would be, because the laptop is viewed much closer to your eyes. The resolution and richness of color isn’t as good as a TV screen, but so far not to an unacceptable degree.
- The sound quality is a step backwards, unless I use my iPod earbuds. External speakers would improve the situation, but negate the laptop’s flexibility.
The TV News Question
I’m going to reveal yet another personal quirk here. I haven’t watched TV news on a regular basis (save a couple of weeks in September, 2001) since the late 1990s. So switching from TV to the laptop made no difference in that regard. Even if you think my rationale for ditching the TV is absurd, try nixing TV news for two weeks. Read your news online and in print publications. You may find that you get better news with far less worthless fluff (ads, transitions from anchor to reporter, nitwit dialogue between anchors, etc.) all in less time.
Final Thoughts
Life without a television may seem completely bizarre, like building a yurt in downtown Manhattan. But it won’t disconnect you from modern life. Television is actually very old technology. It’s been a part of most American households for more than half a century. It is also a one-way medium that encourages passivity.
Finally, TV is an excellent procrastination enabler. I already have enough of those.
3 Comments
This is a great article and I completely agree. OK, so I officially don’t sit in my first law school class for another 18 hours, but nevertheless, with my transition to a new city I also chose to forego cable television. By the way, my cable installer also found it very odd that I was getting internet but no television.
I can’t say that I’ve cut quite as much as you have. I still have a TV and I use an AppleTV in conjunction to watch from my store of enormous amounts of archived movies and TV shows from mine and my girlfriend’s extensive DVD collection. But I still feel like I’m avoiding a huge distraction: I don’t turn the TV on when I’m studying. For background noise, I’m forcing myself to switch to classical music. When I do want to watch a show, though, I watch the show I want, when I want to watch it, using the AppleTV. I watch it without commercials, so 20 minutes later I’m ready to be productive again.
So I guess I’m with you halfway. I don’t think I’d stay sane if I got rid of my television altogether, but I did get rid of cable, and I’m much happier because of it.
Scott,
I think you hit the nail on the head. It’s really about watching what you want to watch, when you want to watch it. I don’t want to give anyone the false idea that I don’t enjoy watching shows or movies from time to time. But for me the key is taking away those random bits of TV-watching that suck up time to no good end.
As for classical music, I find it can be excellent for studying. iTunes even has playlists of classical music specifically for studying.
Congrats to the both of you! I also bailed on the unseeing eye around 2001 when in became clear that I was paying someone to come barging in on my conversations and start yelling about something they wanted to sell me. That and the grotesque sales of 911 merch pushed me over the edge.
Something I never got though; and a lot of people do this; how can you keep the TV on for “background noise”? This baffles me to no end. TV is so full of surprising noises, flashing lights and raised voices, I’d feel like I was doing time in an asylum if I had that going all day… maybe it’s just what one is used to or something..