Summer is a transition time for many people: the break between school years; a vacation before tackling another year of work; and for network television that’s been a guest in our living rooms for so long, summer is a time of transition between seasons.
It’s appropriate then that we are also in the middle of a fundamental transformation of the technology in our living rooms. Traditional broadcast and cable TV are steadily being augmented and enjoyed in new ways such as ‘time-shifted’ and on-demand TV via DVRs and other devices like the Xbox, PCs, tablets and even smartphones. Similarly, DVDs are being replaced by on-demand movie delivery via services such as Netflix and Hulu. And the standard 30- or 60-minute commercial program is no longer the only game in town – today’s entertainment options are a vast cornucopia of content from ultra-short to full length, all delivered over the Internet.