A collection of stories tagged 'viewers' from Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/ Copyright 2006 RoomforMilk.com. RoomforMilk is not affiliated with Slashdot.org. Sat, 22 Nov 2008 07:32:31 EST A new study by sociologists at the University of Maryland concludes that unhappy people watch more TV, while people who describe themselves as 'very happy' spend more time reading and socializing. 'TV doesn't really seem to satisfy people over the long haul the way that social involvement or reading a newspaper does,' says researcher John P. Robinson. 'It's more passive and may provide escape — especially when the news is as depressing as the economy itself. The data suggest to us that the TV habit may offer short-run pleasure at the expense of long-term malaise.' Unhappy people also liked their TV more: 'What viewers seem to be saying is that while TV in general is a waste of time and not particularly enjoyable, "the shows I saw tonight were pretty good."' The researchers analyzed two sets of data spanning nearly 30 years (PDF), gathered from nearly 30,000 adults, and found that unhappy people watch an estimated 20 percent more television than very happy people, after taking into account their education, income, age, and marital status — as well as other demographic predictors of both viewing and happiness. 'TV can become a kind of opiate in a way. It's habitual, and tuning in can be an easy way of tuning out.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/26184 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/TOK1bG8uNiU/article.pl Sat, 15 Nov 2008 16:05:03 EST Ars Technica reports that the debate between broadcasters and white space supporters has intensified after each side recently made inflammatory comments and suggested that science would vindicate their position. Several organizations are pushing to delay the upcoming white space vote, in part because it takes place on the same day as the US presidential election. We recently discussed Google's claim that a test of this system was rigged to fail. From Ars: "The broadcasters contend that adjacent channel interference would be significant even at the 40 mW level proposed by Kevin Martin. In fact, they claim that such a device would interfere with digital television signals when the viewer is 25 miles from the television tower and the whitespace device is 10m or less from the TV set. At 50 miles from the television tower, a whitespace device within 50m from a set could allegedly cause interference. The broadcasters also want several safeguard requirements put on the technology that go beyond the new, lower-power transmission levels."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/25764 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/qwpQgex_Jms/article.pl Sat, 25 Oct 2008 12:05:03 EDT As a young lad and aspiring technologist I have found shows like Revision3's 'The Broken' and 'Systm' to be entertaining, informative, and, most importantly, thorough. As time has gone on revision3 has kept some of the tech-related shows, but dumbed them down to appeal to a larger audience. This annoyed me, but I've continued to be a loyal viewer of their tech shows anyway. However, I suspect this trend to continue and my disappointment to grow. Where can I find tech shows that dive deep into projects and discussions instead of simply skimming the surface?"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/25699 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/B5NRxdnQYoo/article.pl Wed, 22 Oct 2008 05:05:01 EDT An anonymous reader sends in an article by Andrew Keen (author of "The Cult of the Amateur") about TiVo's new TiVo PC, which he believes could seal the fate of advertising on online videos. Just as TiVo let viewers zap commercials on broadcast TV, TiVo PC — a TV tuner that can be plugged into a PC — will let Net viewers of the likes of Hulu.com and ABC.com skip commercials in the nascent medium of online video. Keen believes that TiVo's business model involves (besides selling lots of $199 boxes) mining and selling the far richer stream of user behavioral data that TiVo PC will enable.Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/25350 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/q7CcdggR34k/article.pl Tue, 07 Oct 2008 17:05:07 EDT 'Even if all goes smoothly, next February's digital television shift is likely to generate hundreds of thousands of complaints from television viewers around the country. A major problem during a test run in Wilmington, N.C., was the inability of over-the-air viewers to receive new digital signals, according to figures collected after the test.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/25014 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/s6cg3-pOGwc/article.pl Wed, 24 Sep 2008 15:05:25 EDT An anonymous reader notes that Microsoft has been granted a patent on "Page Up" and "Page Down" keystrokes. The article links an image of an IBM PC keyboard from 1981 with such keys in evidence. "The software giant applied for the patent in 2005, and was granted it on August 19, 2008. US patent number 7,415,666 describes 'a method and system in a document viewer for scrolling a substantially exact increment in a document, such as one page, regardless of whether the zoom is such that some, all or one page is currently being viewed.'... The company received its 5,000th patent from the US Patent and Trademark Office in March 2006, and is currently approaching the 10,000 mark."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/24470 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/380043878/article.pl Sun, 31 Aug 2008 21:05:03 EDT London's Telegraph newspaper reports that some of the fireworks which appeared over Beijing during the television broadcast of the Olympic Opening Ceremony were actually computer generated. But — hold on — it's not necessarily as bad as you think. The faked fireworks were actually set-off at the stadium, but because of potential dangers in filming the display live from a helicopter, viewers at home were shown a pre-recorded, computer-generated shot." To me, the reasoning behind the faked display is no consolation or excuse — it seems hard to swallow that NBC was unaware of this televised deception. I'm glad that it was good-naturedly "revealed" this weekend (according to that Telegraph article), but it's disheartening that such a large crowd can watch (in person, and around the world) such a display and have no reason to realize they've been duped. What about when weightier events are at issue? There's also a slightly more detailed story at sky.com.Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/24091 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/362073632/article.pl Mon, 11 Aug 2008 13:05:01 EDT Hollywood Reporter claims that SMPTE (the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) will 'establish an industry task force to define the parameters of a mastering standard for 3D content distributed via broadcast, cable, satellite, packaged media and the Internet, and played-out on televisions, computer screens and other tethered displays.' Already, Japanese Nippon BS viewers with Hyundai 3D LCD sets can watch an hour of 3D programming daily. Even your existing DLP TV set might be 3D capable today with the addition of LCD shutter glasses." Reader DaMan1970 makes note of another developing television technology; telescopic pixel displays. "Each pixel consists of 2 opposing mirrors where the primary mirror can change shape under an applied voltage. When the pixel is off, the primary & secondary mirrors are parallel & reflect all of the incoming light back into the light source."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/23697 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/342266944/article.pl Tue, 22 Jul 2008 04:05:01 EDT Variety reports on a recent study that says TV viewership's median age is outside the 18-49 years demographic: "The broadcast networks have grown older than ever — if they were a person, they wouldn't even be a part of TV's target demo anymore." These totals exclude DVR users, and apparently the oldest since they started tracking it. Of course you know what the means... TV is for old people! The internet has confirmed it.Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/23314 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/324485023/article.pl Tue, 01 Jul 2008 22:05:01 EDT After 15 years of development, Wine version 1.0 has been released. Wine is an Open Source implementation of the Windows API on top of X, OpenGL, and Unix. While perfect windows compatibility has not yet been achieved, full support for Photoshop CS2, Excel Viewer 2003, Word Viewer 2003 and PowerPoint Viewer 2003 have been among the goals prior to the release. For further information about supported applications, head over to the appdb. Get it (source) while it's hot."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/23034 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/313936518/article.pl Tue, 17 Jun 2008 15:05:14 EDT An anonymous reader writes with a link to "an offline Wikipedia viewer for the iRex Iliad e-ink e-book reader (similar to Amazon's Kindle). Take it anywhere — and you don't need to be connected to the Internet in any way!" (You'll need a 4GB flash card and the ability to follow the directions.)Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/22543 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/296123010/article.pl Thu, 22 May 2008 19:05:01 EDT NBC activated the 'broadcast flag' on a number of shows this week, ranging from American Gladiator to Medium, which prevented compliant programs like Windows Media Center from recording them. The matter is being 'looked into,' but that doesn't tell us whether it was an accident or a ploy to see how outraged viewers would be at being stripped of the time-shifting rights they've enjoyed ever since Sony v. Universal. Just in case it's the latter, it wouldn't hurt to let them know what you think."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/22394 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/290875405/article.pl Thu, 15 May 2008 10:05:07 EDT Analyzing DVR viewing research, Ad Age has noted something unexpected: older DVR users are more likely to skip ads than younger DVR users. The skew is particularly apparent among men: 50% of seniors skipping all the ads, but only 20% of teens do so. Women of any age group tend to be around 35%. Ad Age hypothesizes that younger viewers 'just pay attention to other media when the ads are on TV or, worse yet, perhaps the TV is just 'background music'... I always thought that ad skipping was a major benefit of DVRs. Do you skip all the ads?"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/22379 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/290339162/article.pl Wed, 14 May 2008 15:05:04 EDT Analyzing DVR viewing research, Ad Age has noted something unexpected: older DVR users are more likely to skip ads than younger DVR users. The skew is particularly apparent among men: 50% of seniors skipping all the ads, but only 20% of teens do so. Women of any age group tend to be around 35%. Ad Age hypothesizes that younger viewers 'just pay attention to other media when the ads are on TV or, worse yet, perhaps the TV is just "background music"...' I always thought that ad skipping was a major benefit of DVRs. Do you skip all the ads?"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/22367 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/289991847/article.pl Wed, 14 May 2008 04:05:01 EDT Industry regulator Ofcom, which yesterday launched the first phase of its review into public service broadcasting, is threatening to impose a tax on UK broadband ISPs to help resolve funding problems. The review covers all public service broadcasters, both publicly owned and commercial. Ofcom Chief Executive Ed Richards said: 'Public service broadcasting is at a crossroads. Viewers still want a mix of high quality UK-made content, but the traditional television model is not enough to meet all their needs. Today's proposals outline options for a securely-funded PSB future. Now is the time for a wide-ranging debate looking carefully and dispassionately at all the options.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/21749 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/269035557/article.pl Sat, 12 Apr 2008 14:05:03 EDT Linux.com's Bruce Byfield is reporting that Salasaga, the renamed Flame Project, is attempting to fill the functionality gap of Flash creation for Linux in addition to being a cross-platform tool. While it still lacks the spit-shine of more mature apps, it is going a long way to filling yet another hole in Linux software. "Opening Salasaga, you could easily think you are in a slide show program. Individual slides display on the left, and the current slide appears on the bottom right. On the top right is information about the layers on the current side. Menus are logically laid out across the top of the editing window. From the editing menu, you can set the defaults for new projects, including the default display size of finished projects, the preview width, and the default background color. After adjusting these settings, you proceed logically from the right as you develop a project, progressing from Screenshots for importation through Slide and Layer to Export. This progression is so logical that few viewers should have trouble teaching themselves the basics of the software and producing a test project in less than 20 minutes -- and saving it in native .flame format or exporting it to Flash or SVG formats."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/21372 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/257270950/article.pl Mon, 24 Mar 2008 18:05:01 EDT The Pew group has released its annual study into the state of news media. They conclude that science and technology content is a rare treat for cable newscast viewers; some five hours of programming could pass with the average viewer seeing only one minute of science news coverage."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/21249 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/253587167/article.pl Tue, 18 Mar 2008 09:05:05 EDT Phoronix has up a list compiling eight of the most interesting improvements on track for GNOME 2.22. These improvements include the Epiphany browser switching to the WebKit back-end, transition effects inside the Evince document viewer, a new GNOME application for taking photos and recording videos from web cameras followed by applying special effects, a mouse tweaking module for improved accessibility, and a new GNOME VNC client. On the multimedia end, GNOME 2.22 has a few new features appended to the Totem movie player and the Rhythmbox player. Totem can now search and play YouTube videos and connect to a MythTV server and watch past recordings or view live TV. Rhythmbox now can utilize FM radio tuners, integration with new lyric sites, improved Podcast feed support, and even has support for communicating with newer Sony PSPs. There will also be a standalone Flash player and flash previewing support from the file browser in this release."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/20287 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/225372032/article.pl Tue, 29 Jan 2008 13:05:01 EST CNET News.com reports on the reasons behind the unpopularity of DVD recorders in the US. The devices, which have seen heavy support in Europe and Asia, fall flat in the United States. The biggest reason is the penetration of Cable television. With cable, the same show can appear on a channel several times. In Europe and Japan, viewers need to grab copies of shows when they can, as it could be some time before the episode is broadcast again. TiVo also took off more rapidly in the States and elsewhere. TiVo is also one of the reasons selling TVs with embedded hard drives in the States remains a challenge."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/20067 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/218461294/article.pl Thu, 17 Jan 2008 17:05:01 EST News.com notes that the social sites have been burning up in the wake of the debates, as users create more content than it's possible to follow. Facebook specifically set up an area for debate viewers to post messages and take surveys during the events. Some participants found it a bit worthless, and the article refers to the experience as 'information overload'. "No doubt, the political twitterers must've felt empowered to know their Soundboard comments were being beamed out to an audience of potentially millions of Facebook users, and, if plucked by ABC's designated Facebook-monitoring reporter on TV, millions of offline viewers as well. Still, it's a little unclear whether the comments will prove all that useful for campaigns looking to boost their candidates' standing."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/19853 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/212238801/article.pl Sun, 06 Jan 2008 18:05:01 EST CNET's Crave site has an interesting article on Amazon's Kindle eBook reader, and the extensive reverse-engineering that fans of the device have accomplished. The site specifically points out the work of Igor Skochinsky at the Reversing Everything website. His work on the Kindle's Root Shell has revealed some fascinating goodies: 'Among the ones uncovered and described on his blog are a basic photo viewer, a minesweeper game, and most interesting, location technology that uses the Kindle's CDMA networking to pinpoint its position. There also are some basic location-based services that call up a Google Maps view to show where you are and nearby gas stations and restaurants.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/19818 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/211211731/article.pl Fri, 04 Jan 2008 14:05:33 EST Technology Review has a fantastic seven page piece titled "You Don't Understand Our Audience" by former Dateline correspondent John Hockenberry. In it he discusses how NBC (and the networks at large) has missed and wasted opportunities brought by the Internet; and how they work to hard to get viewers at the expense of actual news. The story describes various events such as turning down a report on who al-Qaeda is for a reality show about firefighters, having to tie a story about a radical student group into American Dreams, and the failure to cover events like Kurt Cobain suicide (except as an Andy Rooney complaint piece)."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/19786 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/210228255/article.pl Wed, 02 Jan 2008 22:05:01 EST According to a new study, internet advertisements work better than television advertisements. Internet video watchers were reported to be 47 percent more "engaged" by the advertising they watched than were traditional TV viewers. The report does not mention whether pornographic internet advertisements were included in the study."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/19672 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/206794533/article.pl Wed, 26 Dec 2007 22:05:03 EST Last100 has an interesting post from Guinevere Orvis, a web producer who works in the broadcast industry, who describes the way in which 'unofficial' but sanctioned BitTorrent leaks are being used as a measurement of a TV show's likely success. Orvis writes: 'Broadcasters aren't posting their shows directly on PirateBay yet, but they are talking informally and giving copies of shows to a friend of a friend who is unaffiliated with the company to make a torrent ... it's partially an experiment, but the hope is that distribution of content this way will lead to new viewers that wouldn't have been reached through traditional marketing means.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/19433 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/199926635/article.pl Thu, 13 Dec 2007 16:05:01 EST A report from Science Daily says that scientists have proven that the presence of other people may enhance our movie-watching experiences by influencing and gradually synchronizing viewer emotional responses. This mutual mimicry also affects each participant's evaluation of the overall experience — the more in sync we are with the people around us, the more we like the movie. In a series of experiments, researchers found that people watching a film together appeared to evaluate the film within the same broad mood and another study found that synchrony of evaluations can be traced to glances at the other person during the film and adoption of the observed expressions. 'By mimicking expressions, people catch each other's moods leading to a shared emotional experience. That feels good to people and they attribute that good feeling to the quality of the movie,' said one researcher."Read more of this story at Slashdot. http://www.roomformilk.com/launch/19345 http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/197540244/article.pl Sun, 09 Dec 2007 09:05:01 EST