Back in the day of nothing but black & white television sets, we marveled at the accessibility of moving pictures, film, then video. I remember seeing an actual strip/clip of the tape and held it to the light to look for imagery of any kind. Analog technology was something new to the general public and this alone was a phenomenon in itself.
We all heard that someday ‘soon’ television sets would eventually broadcast in color. Oh my goodness, really?
Technology started to expand but it seemed like a manageable expansion, unlike the exponential explosion of technological advances of today. Full color did eventually come to television sets, but they were expensive and very large. It wasn’t the screen size that was large, it was the ‘set’ itself that was big and bulky. Any new color tv owner would need a couple of things: able to pay some serious cash for the unit, and have significant space in the room the unit would soon occupy. All for a color tv and the bragging rights it seemed to come with.
I remember screen sizes were 12″, then 14″, then jumping to 19″ and it kind of stayed there as the ‘norm’ for quite some time. Screen size eventually grew to 25″ and that was the cream-of-the-crop, until 27″ came along. By this time, tv units were much ‘smaller’ but the box-like size of the tv itself was large, bulky, and heavy.
We needed that, and then we needed more.
Picture/Image quality began to improve, but at a cost few could afford. Screen sizes continued to grow and technology brought new tv possibilities. And we needed more.
Consumer product makers were now experiencing the runaway trajectory of technology growth and ‘new’ television sets became monitors used for multi-purpose tasks. Broadcasting became all digital along the way and tv’s in general had a short technological shelf-life compared to their massive counterparts of yesteryear.
Black & white television quickly became a thing of the past. All for ‘the more’ of what we had to have, just because we could.
Now, those of us who remember black and white television enjoy watching some of the old b&w TV shows and movies. I know why this is so. It takes us back to a ‘simpler time’ in our lives. At the risk of sounding old, guess what, I don’t care. Nostalgia is something that is wired in us as human beings. I am a member of a people who long for a sense of balance and comfort.
I’m not sure what will be the ‘next’ nostalgic mark for society and our future generation. How about love and care for what is right in front of us?
How about equilibrium?
Petdad 