This article on how Twitter is bringing back ‘event TV’, providing the watercoooler where shows are discussed, is worth a read for media students.
The phenomenon is too new for any official research to have been carried out, but anecdotal evidence suggests I am not alone in finding that Twitter has become embedded in my TV viewing (non-) life. Social networking sites – especially Twitter, because it is designed to exchange real-time responses among a loose group of people – are restoring a sense of excitement to television.
Event TV was thought to be dying as channels proliferated, people timeshifted their viewing and audiences fragmented in a way that made the viewing figures of yesteryear (21.6 million to find out who shot JR, 28 million every time Eric and Ernie popped their Christmas hats on, 32.3 million for the 1966 World Cup) seem like the fevered dream of an overstrained ITV exec. “Watercooler moments”, whereby people gathered the next day at work to talk about a particular attention-snagging programme or plot twist, were deemed to have vanished. Now they are back. The only difference is you don’t have to wait until the next day to share your amazement, vent your spleen or bemoan the death/betrayal/surprisingly good profiteroles of your favourite character, singer or #gbbo contestant.
via How Twitter saved event TV | Technology | The Guardian.
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