In 2020, most people experience the media horizontally, as opposed to vertically.
This doesn’t mean that we watch TV lying down vs, standing up. Instead, it means that we watch programs at times that are convenient to us, which is not necessarily at the same times as our neighbors and friends.
It can take weeks to get around to watching a particular episode of, say, “The Tonight Show.” Or it can take months to make it all the way through the 10-episode first season of “You,” while other viewers polish it off in a weekend. Plot all those dates on a graph and it would be horizontal.
Back in the day (said the crotchety old man), most entertainment was vertical. Consumers listened to the same radio stations and watched the same TV programs at the same time as everybody else.
If something was missed, it was really missed. Maybe it would be repeated over the summer, at the whim of some anonymous programmer, or maybe it wouldn’t.
Vertical entertainment drew folks together around water coolers (remember those?) and provided common talking points. With only three networks and a handful of static-filled independent stations, TV pickings were slim, so chances were good that most everybody was tuning in to the same stuff — vertical entertainment for the masses.
This started to change with the advent of recordable media. Betamax and VHS machines allowed viewers to capture vertical entertainment and watch it horizontally — whenever they wanted. Now, with the arrival of Netflix, Hulu and a bevy of other streaming services, viewers watch (or, in the case of podcasts, listen to) almost everything horizontally. Somebody recommends something, and maybe you’ll get around to it — eventually.
Vertical TV — those must-see-them-at-the-same-time-as-everybody-else events — are limited to breaking news of truly monumental proportions and high-stakes sporting events. The Super Bowl is probably the last bastion of vertical TV, where more than half the charm comes from knowing you are watching the same big plays and big-budget commercials at the same moment as the neighbor across the street and people across the country.
Readers, of course, have always experienced books horizontally. Even book-club members reading the same title are doing so at slightly different times — Barb has barely cracked the cover, while James is two-thirds of the way through.
Alliance’s One Book One Community program is a unique mixture of horizontal and vertical experiences. Readers are chugging through this year’s book, “Orphan Train” by Christina Baker Kline, at their own speed, which makes the process horizontal.
But they are also invited to participate in several communal events, such as a “Documenting Your Family History” presentation at 7 p.m. on Feb. 10 at First United Presbyterian Church, along with two other events on March 2 and March 9 at Rodman Library. Programming culminates with an appearance by the author March 26 at Union Avenue United Methodist Church.
All of these are vertical events, with people interacting with one another at the same time, extending and amplifying their horizontal reading of the novel.
For the record, I’m not objective where this book and the OBOC are concerned. As part of the committee, I can attest that members worked hard over the last few months to find a book for readers across the greater Alliance area to enjoy, and we believe we’ve found a winner with “Orphan Train.”
The future of entertainment may be horizontal, with more and more people pursuing different options at different times and fragmenting audiences in ways that are exciting and lead to more diversity.
But there is still something to be said for a communal experience, which is why it’s nice to see scores of people turning out for live events like this year’s OBOC programming.
I hope many readers elect to go vertical in 2020 and hop aboard the “Orphan Train” in the next few weeks.
chris.schillig@yahoo.com
@cschillig on Twitter
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