Showdown: TV vs. Internet

So I opened my Facebook today and got my daily dose of news vis-à-vis my “trending” sidebar (like I always do, what, do I look like I have enough money or time to subscribe to NYT?) and combed through the articles. Of course, a few interesting topics caught my eye including Nick Jonas releasing more new songs (yay?) and some other junk I don’t remember. But then I saw an article about HBO that could change the way television works, quite possibly forever.

Starting in 2015, HBO will be offering a (paid) subscription to their web content (i.e. their TV shows) that is separate from your cable subscription.

Pause. Wait for it. You can watch HBO online, free, without having cable????

As someone who has lived without cable for some time now and has had to rely on, ah, “other” means to consume her favorite television content, this is fantastic news. Now, it still costs money so I mean I’m not screaming into the abyss in joy over this new development. Again, do I look like someone who can afford to pay for HBO? My mom pays for our Netflix and that’s already pushing it.

But for other people who don’t want to pay for the 1000+ (sometimes like 8000??? why????) channels but still want to get their weekly dose of Game of Thrones, this is great. And actually revolutionary.

Netflix was the pioneer, creating a way for TV to be accessible through the internet. Then Hulu decided to step it up, creating a way for people to not only view old seasons of popular TV shows, but for a way to view the current season in case you have that one last discussion Wednesday nights and miss Modern Family every week. And now you have HBO, creating another avenue for you to consume television content on the internet.

This may seem somewhat irrelevant to the topic of art, other than the obvious fact that TV shows are a piece of film art and this relates to TV, but I think that the way that a culture consumes its art is equally important to what it consumes. The internet has been changing the game since it started, and in the past two years we’ve seen an overhaul of how our lives work – we shape our lives around the internet now. It’s not something that I’m saying is bad, but it’s a fact. Just this summer the popular to some show Legend of Korra made the somewhat controversial switch from television to internet. Even though it seems illogical – a made for TV show goes completely digital like it’s a cheap YouTube series – it’s actually the smartest move for the show. Kids weren’t watching Korra like the teens were. Korra, as a sequel series to Avatar: The Last Airbender, was made for the kids who liked Avatar and grew up. Now, they aren’t watching Nick every Saturday morning – they’re on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and watching their shows on Netflix and Hulu between cramming for finals.

And that’s only one example. But now, this huge move for HBO points in that same direction. TV is packing its bags with only one destination in mind: the internet.

Whether that’s a good move is up to you to decide. But like it or not, it’s happening, and the way that we think of television is changing.