Confessions of a 21st Century Couch Potato

By Philip Elmer-DeWitt

Call me old-fashioned. My kids do. I'm old enough to remember when televisions were dumber than airport washbasins and didn't know you were standing in front of them unless you switched them on. But when I come home from a long day at the recycling plant, I still like to plop down on the ergolounger, crack open a microbrew, dial the teleputer to what we used to call a channel and just veg out. Don't get me wrong. I like the little programmable hostess who greets me every night on my flat-panel screen. In fact, since I upgraded to the new version, the one in the high-res body stocking, I've developed a bit of a crush on her. I love the way she spices up the stuff that's good for me with the trashier stuff I like to watch. The other night when I told her I wanted to check out this new service the fellows at work were raving about, she said, "I know you don't like to hear about international news, but before I take you to co-ed nude volleyball, you should probably know that Japan has invaded New South Wales." She made it sound so interesting I actually switched to the Internews server to hear what those clowns in the White House had to say. I ended up ordering a laserprint of the press conference and having it read to me the next morning while I shaved.

You don't see my son the couch commando doing stuff like that, unless maybe he's getting school credit. He thinks he's such a big shot since he got his varsity letter in video kick boxing. He drives me crazy the way he does 15 things at once, watching the ball game on one corner of the screen, visiting Bangkok on another, jumping to whatever wild file server his punk videobot digs up. These onscreen hosts are supposed to learn more as they get to know your tastes, but I swear his gets dumber by the day.

His sister the power potato is no better. Takes after her mother, she does, hanging out in the video mall all day, watching infomercials for store credit and then squandering her savings on those damn dating services. In my day kids actually met each other before they started talking dirty online, parading around in front of the videophone wearing what they were born with and not much more!

But you've got to say: they sure know their way around the info highway. The other day they showed me how to get to the computer file where they store all the old sitcoms from the '90s, back before the telcos merged with the cable + operators and the broadcast networks collapsed. I'd forgotten how they used to throw the same old ads on everybody's screen, trying to sell you zirconium siding whether you owned a house or not.

Those were the good old days, when TV signals came over the air and telephone calls came over wire. I remember when we used to say 500 channels were plenty, who needed digital this, two-way that, broadband switching and all that interactive mumbo jumbo? But once people got used to the idea of dialing their TVs like telephones and ordering up shows from the storage disks, things just took off.

At first there was home shopping, then video-on-demand, and then long- distance video games. Pretty soon we had video party lines, video bulletin boards, virtual house calls, electronic classifieds, real-time Yellow Pages, laser-print coupon clubs, interactive soap operas and all the rest. The only people who weren't plugged in were those pointy heads who never owned a TV set in the first place. I saw one of them the other day, walking outside, making a fuss over the flowers. Hey, I'm no lowbrow. I used to go to the movies!

I know what you're thinking. If I got out more, paid a little more attention to my wife, maybe I'd still be married. O.K., I was wrong. I thought the microwave she could set from work would make her happy. How was I to know she'd fall for some guy who liked to talk better than he liked to interact? But I'm not complaining. I've got my health. I've got my remote. I've got my little video friend.

Life's like a digital switch that way. There are a million paths it can take. You make your choices. You live with the consequences. There is no instant replay.