How The Internet Has Changed Television

The way we enjoy television has changed drastically throughout the past two decades. Growing up, several families throughout the United Kingdom only had four channels on their television screens, and with these they had to make do. Nowadays of course, a large proportion of Brits not only have Sky, Virgin Media cable, FreeView or some sort of television service provider, but also online television accessibility. With all this under consideration, it’s fair to add that the internet has revolutionized television. Here are a few ways by which that revolution has been made.

On Demand Television

The ability to catch up on missed programs through online channels such as ITV Player, BBC iPlayer and 4oD has reduced the need for an actual television somewhat. Though on-demand television certainly isn’t limitless, it does offer us capabilities far beyond that which we had at our disposal a decade or so ago.
The limitations of on-demand television, with some programs not available due to licensing reasons among others, means that we’re still not getting as much out of on-demand television as we could be. However, with it being so easy to stream and download programs off third party and illegal sources, expect on-demand television to offer more and more to viewers.

Third Party Streaming Websites

Third party streaming websites show programs, films and live television to viewers without the permission of the program or programmer. Their significances take up many forms.
First and foremost, like on-demand television, programs can be watched via these sites after they have been aired on television. Furthermore, live television can be watched.
On the matter of live television in the UK, it is the streaming of sports games not shown live on British television – 3pm Saturday Premier League football for example – that generates great significance. Internet users can now watch practically every game of their football team throughout a season, with a service that is improving in both reliability and accessibility.

Downloading Content

The ability to download television content has also had a great impact on the way we enjoy television. Perhaps most significant is the downloading of films. There is very little reason nowadays to subscribe to all of the movie channels in a TV service provider such as Sky, when you can download any film you want to see off the internet for free.
With internet speeds forever improving, films can be downloaded within a very short amount of time – sometimes even fifteen or twenty minutes – refuting the purpose of TV movie channels with a frustrating amount of breaks.
The frequency of TV advertising has undermined television, as on-demand programming and streamed television generally have far fewer adverts, and downloads are advertisement free.

Android & Smart TVs

The revolution of the internet over television is more than the increase of different ways to view TV content however. It also pertains to Smart TVs and Android TVs such as Visopix, which allow users to surf the internet via their televisions.

From social media to online gaming and general web surfing, the emergence of internet televisions has merged the relationship between TV and the web even closer together.

Author Bio:
Richard Davids is a British freelance writer and technology enthusiast.