Newz(AP) — If the TV remote hadn’t been invented, channel surfers and couch potatoes would have to argue about something else. Come to think of it, those surfers and potatoes might not even exist. It may be difficult for anyone under 40 to understand, but there was a time when changing a channel meant getting up, walking over to the “television set” and turning a “dial.” Scientists at Zenith Electronics recognized a problem that needed to be solved fairly quickly.
The first TV remote, called “Lazy Bone,” was put on the market in 1950. The first wireless remote, the “Flash-Matic,” five years later, looked disturbingly like a gun and used light signals. The TV wasn’t discriminating, and on sunny days false signals could cause spontaneous channel changes.
The next year, Zenith’s “Space Command” was introduced using sound waves. On those early models, the press of a button produced a clicking noise – hence the term “clicker.” Remotes using infrared signals emerged in the 1980s when, with the dawn of cable’s multichannel universe, the device became indispensable. “Losing the remote in the couch cushions became as frantic an event as losing a phone is today,” says David Bianculli, TV critic for NPR’s “Fresh Air” and a professor at Rowan University in New Jersey.
Remotes influenced how TV was programmed and consumed. The flow of a network’s schedule was essential: How do you prevent a viewer from changing channels? CBS’ Saturday night schedule in the 1970s, from “All in the Family” through to “The Carol Burnett Show,” was a masterpiece in program flow.
NBC once considered Thursday nights “must-see TV.” The early days of cable produced the surfer, who aimlessly pressed the remote to scan channels. That put a premium on flashy; you had to catch the eye. They reproduce uncontrollably until you don’t know which to use.
Batteries die at inopportune moments. Now that appliances can listen, maybe remotes fade away. Until then, it’s back to searching for wherever you left the clicker.
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