“Who watches TV on the TV anymore anyway?” – wise words from an episode of “Gossip Girl” in 2009. It’s perfectly true, and I can attest to that, seeing as I don’t really remember turning on a television in the last four years. Why would I need to, when I have Netflix on my laptop and I can watch season after season of “Arrested Development” in the comfort of my own bed, without my brother asking to please change the channel every five minutes? It’s really no fun to wait for scheduled programming, no one wants to race down to the living room at eight to watch “Scandal” interspersed with commercial breaks only to find Dad watching the news and in a bathrobe and a mood, looking to grill you about the latest credit card bill.
When I heard about the recent $49 billion acquisition of DirecTV by AT&T, I was anything but surprised. Even though there is some time to go before the deal is completely closed, this just serves as an irrefutable sign that the age of binge TV is really and truly here to stay, and everyone is a part of the game whether or not they actually own a TV. This merging of TV with wireless service could be a game changer for the way people watch their shows; there are already speculations about new ways that consumers who opt for AT&T will be able to stream content directly to their phones. The demand for satellite TV is poised for decline over the next few years as web-oriented TV makes its way up the ladder, and perhaps AT&T has made this decision at a good time, buying out DirecTV before stocks start to plummet.
What does all this mean for communications and advertisers? With the onset of services like Netflix, and people being able to watch shows on their phones, tablets, and computers, it could be that commercial breaks have served their purpose. It’s certainly time to think of something new to replace them. It wouldn’t be an easy task to generate another method that is as effective, reaches millions of people, and would become as easily internalized – people know when they watch TV on an actual TV, they will be interrupted by dog food advertisements and, by now, they are okay with that. What could we come up with that would become just as easily ingrained and accepted? Puppies embossed with logos, maybe, running by people on the street every few seconds, or perhaps a little voice that emits from your shopping cart and speaks to you as you walk around the produce section, or perhaps a brand-campaign managing version of Big Brother who drops down on giant screens, belts out a nice jingle, and leaves? There’s no one answer, there can be many and maybe it’s time to start looking for them.
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