[mythtv-users] How to make people watch TV in real time

[Jerome Yuzyk]

On Wednesday 10 October 2007 10:44, Jay R. Ashworth wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 09, 2007 at 04:38:58PM -0700, Gabe Rubin wrote:
> > The fantasy football junkie in me won't let me do that.  And with
> > sports news diseminated so quickly, sports are really the one thing I
> > do watch live (and have to suffer through commercials for -- and
> > commercials during non-superbowl football, are REAL bad...i.e. "This
> > is MYYYYYYYYY COUNTRYYYYYYYY")
>
> This makes, inadvertantly, a very good point about broadcast television
> in the naughties.
>
> If a network is really motivated to increase its overnight ratings for
> programs, then encouraging any communities which form around them
> (instead of discouraging them, as oh, say, Fox has been known to do;
> threatening lawsuits against fansites, etc) is the most productive
> thing they can do: it motivates people to want to watch in real time so
> they don't have to avoid {spoilers on their} mailing lists.
>
> Cheers,
> -- jra

But how much real-time does one need? I follow CFL, NFL, NHL a little NASCAR 
and will check in on the World Series over the next few weeks. I just 
time-shift an hour and that pretty much lets me Skip-30 through all the 
commercials and not catch up to real-time. If I want to speed-watch a game 
(skip the chatter, commercials and inter-play delays) I wait 2 hours.

I guess this wouldn't work if I was online with others during a game though.