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A whole family in the living room watching TV


Gordon Dry

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1969: men land on Moon, nearly the complete mankind is watching it live - with some delay - in black and white and bad picture quality.
People outside of the U.S. are awake at night.
People gather in front of TV stores.

today: if people would land on Mars, how would it be?
A whole family, together? Watching TV live - with a delay, but in way better quality?
Why? Daughter got a smart phone and a tablet. Toddler only got a Play-Doh-Tablet. They sit in their rooms.
People will to their all day struggle stuff while a few land on Mars. They can watch later on youtube.

In future, when it happens?
How people in the (well, likely) civilized world react? Better watch a reaction to a reaction vid on youtube of the real landing 2 days later, because the famous youtube star looks better?

Who knows...

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people would all be squinting at their own little screens. i for one refuse to use a screen that small and covered with finger prints. 

then you will have a massive group of people who will claim the whole thing is really expensive cgi.

even the ones that believe it will be like 'meh'.

a handfull of space nerds will find the thing profound.

Edited by Nuke
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The 50's and 60's were a totally different existence. IMO, better.

Current day, a particular political ideology (global infestation that it is) is hell-bent on the idea of destroying the traditional family unit (as defined by western civilization)... because their form of government knows better than you and can take care of you better than you can for yourself. As long as it survives, you'll never have that family gathered together again in the living room watching history unfold together... much less talking about it and discussing it together.

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The public reaction will the same, if not better than the first manned Moon landing. Keep in mind that two of the most viewed live events on YouTube are space related (Red Bull Stratos and Falcon Heavy). The Red Bull Stratos event was viewed 8 million times, and around 40-50 million people watched it afterwards, and thats not counting the people who watched it through television. And that is just a guy jumping from a balloon that technically isn't even in space.

I imagine the first manned Mars Landing to get at LEAST 100 million live viewers (keep in mind that in the future more people will have acces to the internet), and at least 1 billion views, within the next few days on YouTube alone. Also, keep in mind that YouTube and other video sharing/streaming networks will likely kill this whole television thing. The only thing television has and social media doesn't have is game shows. You can read the news, watch movies, and stuff like that on your tiny little metal box. As sad as it may be, old things will fall for better alternatives.

That doesn't mean you can't watch the thing with your whole family though. You can connnect YouTube with your big screen quite easily within 2 seconds, just by tapping a button. Imagine how much easier it gets within the next 20 years.

Oh, and another thing, the Mars mission will not just be one, or two events, unlike the Apollo 11 launch and landing. Im pretty sure the Astronauts are going to make some sort of weekly vlog/recap on their way and on the surface. This makes for a ton of things to discuss with friends and family. Im pretty sure an intense moment like hiding from a solar storm would make for a truckload of YouTube views and family discussions.

The Flat Earth and Moon Hoax thing will likely be murdered too, the more people in the world, and the internet, the more people who can look down at you and laugh at your crazy talk. We already saw the first Flat Earther take off his hat a month ago.

 

Im sorry, but i sort of despise this good old days were better and now everything is worse because of modern technology talk. Its not going to be worse, its just not going to be the same way as you are used to.

Edited by NSEP
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Meh all that's different is these days the people who don't want to interact with each other don't interact with each other. Families that actually want to talk to each other still do. Those that don't, talk to the people they want to talk to instead of whomever they happen to be near at the time.

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It will be just like the world championship but with every nation in the finals. I cant even begin to imagine the hype buildup...

Just like with the moon landing everyone with access to a screen will watch it, no matter if they were interested in space before. This now propably means the majority of earths population, >5 billion people.

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I think part of the problem you will run into is that many people just don't care about stuff like that anymore. When a Mars landing occurs there will probably be a large fraction of the population who will simply be watching something else. (Which also brings up the fact that when the Moon landing occurred there wasn't really an option to watch something else. All of the networks were covering it live, there really wasn't anything else on. With technology today, there's always something else on.)

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2 hours ago, Elthy said:

It will be just like the world championship but with every nation in the finals. I cant even begin to imagine the hype buildup...

Just like with the moon landing everyone with access to a screen will watch it, no matter if they were interested in space before. This now propably means the majority of earths population, >5 billion people.

I can imagine the launch and initial landing; But I wonder about the events following, if, like the Apollo ventures, viewership trails off... unless of course something really drastic happens, like a catastrophe or existence-changing discovery (life, ancient civilization, etc).

 

2 hours ago, TheSaint said:

I think part of the problem you will run into is that many people just don't care about stuff like that anymore. When a Mars landing occurs there will probably be a large fraction of the population who will simply be watching something else. (Which also brings up the fact that when the Moon landing occurred there wasn't really an option to watch something else. All of the networks were covering it live, there really wasn't anything else on. With technology today, there's always something else on.)

According to network statistics (if I find the link again I'll post it), a full 7% of Americans were watching something else at the time... not 'doing' something else, 'watching' something else.

Edit:
Found it - http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/featured/moonwalk-draws-125-million-viewers-cbs-and-cronkite-win-big/

Edited by LordFerret
found it
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10 hours ago, Gordon Dry said:

People outside of the U.S. are awake at night.

That's just your "perfect view", mate. No one in India or China cared, no one in my country cares any number of. TV is a luxury item back then, radio don't broadcast in midnight in a good amount of the world (20h UTC / 16h EDT means 01h UTC+5, 03h UTC+7, 05h UTC+9).

 

Let's be honest, people who would care would, people who wouldn't care wouldn't. Simple as that.

 

If there's any better today, the Internet are already more of a common resource, so if anything, fingers cross everyone will take some care of it when it happens.

Cheers !

Edited by YNM
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13 hours ago, NSEP said:

this good old days were better and now everything is worse because of modern technology talk

That was not my purpose.

IMHO a mix of highly sophisticated tech that is not public beta testing like nowadays AND ancient / medieval knowledge AND ecologic morale fit well together.

But the fiat money system has to change first.

10 hours ago, Elthy said:

hype buildup

Mars commercials from mouth to bottom products.

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12 hours ago, LordFerret said:

@NSEP

First moon shot was seen live by over 125 million Americans... just Americans. Total global live audience was estimated at around 600 million.

Remember that i said that AT LEAST 100 million viewers are from YouTube alone. Alternative websites like Youku have in total 500 million users and 800 million active daily views TODAY. Not just that, the 'we can watch it later' thing we have nowadays isn't that bad at all. I fully expect less people watch the live event and watch it later instead. And there is nothing wrong with re-watching an event, rather than staying up till 4am on a workday. Heck, you can even re-watch it with your whole family, like i did with Falcon Heavy.

Also, don't forget the memes, yes memes.

falcon_heavy_just_had_to_become_a_target

SpaceX-Elon-Musk-Starman-Meme-Cover.png

Don't you think that memes like this will just embrace the discussion? Teens share and stare at memes all the time. When Falcon Heavy launched, almost EVERY meme page on instagram was pumping out Falcon Heavy memes. You'd think there would be a bigger meme explosion when a spacecraft launches and lands on Mars with people, oh and don't forget the events during the Mars transfer. If Memes could carry a disease it would have infected half of our entire population within a day.

Edited by NSEP
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12 hours ago, LordFerret said:

First moon shot was seen live by over 125 million Americans... just Americans. Total global live audience was estimated at around 600 million.

600 - 125 = 475

That's just everyone in Europe and North America, probably Australia too. Some expats, and some in Japan. Everyone else (3 billion in Asia and Africa) just sleeps or do anything else more worthwhile.

 

With Internet, however... I guess even Ethiopians will know. Soon.

Edited by YNM
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7 minutes ago, YNM said:

That's just everyone in Europe and North America, probably Australia too

Exactly. Almost everyone who could watch it did. The UDSSR didnt broadcast live, almost everyone else on earth was to poor for a TV (not to mention there were only 3,5 billion humans on Earth back then). I doubt there ever was a TV event with higher global viewing figures.

Also i seriosly doubt people will watch it on youtube a few hours later, this is just like world chapionship final, you have to watch it live for the real tension.

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5 minutes ago, Elthy said:

you have to watch it live for the real tension.

Oh, I'm burning here XD

Why should my sleeping schedule be dictated by some fluke from 12 hrs away ?!!

Were there ever anything important on 06.00 AM EDT ?

Edited by YNM
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26 minutes ago, Elthy said:

Also i seriosly doubt people will watch it on youtube a few hours later, this is just like world chapionship final, you have to watch it live for the real tension.

The Falcon Heavy launch was viewed 2 million times live and 15 million watched it a few hours afterwards. 

The thing with a World Championship Final is that there is something to spoil. There is no possibility A and B in spaceflight events other than the 1% chance of failure.

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2 minutes ago, NSEP said:

The thing with a World Championship Final is that there is something to spoil.

Even then, pictures worth a thousand words. Videos are thousands of pictures...

Also, live-viewing is just not reeeally the culture anymore, right ?

 

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You guys didn't read the article I posted along with my comment AT ALL, did you. <_<

" A network of 20 earth stations, interconnected with satellites, carried the TV programs to viewers in the U.S., Latin America, Europe, North Africa, Asia and Australia. "

That pretty much covers the globe now doesn't it.

 

As for memes; At best, the only purpose they serve today is to clutter up data feeds with dumb BS. :rolleyes:

 

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26 minutes ago, LordFerret said:

As for memes; At best, the only purpose they serve today is to clutter up data feeds with dumb BS.

And news are fed from Twitter.

Spoiler

 

 

7 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

Thousands from this forum will be teaching them, how.

I think I'd be in the "nah, too busy for that" camp.

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