Dear Verizon FIOS
2008-03-04 | Filed under TV |
Let me give you a glimpse into the workings of a customer’s brain.
I am now trained to watch TV on demand. I came to your service pre-trained by Comcast, and though your menu interface is kinda inconvenient and slow, I adapted quickly. Because, really, it’s a matter of clicking on whatever I want to watch, and like many TV viewers, I am fundamentally lazy. The manufacturers of TV remotes have thoroughly explored the commercial opportunities of such laziness. And now, thanks to advances in digital entertainment, I don’t even have to purchase tapes (tape! what a silly storage medium!) and remember to program a VCR. (I am lazy, not stupid. Programming a VCR is easy. Remembering to program it is more challenging.)
You have trained me well, you On Demand providers. I don’t know when shows air. I don’t care when shows air. When they queue up, I watch them. Happiness abounds.
And yet, you have betrayed me, Verizon FIOS. At the beginning of series programs, you have spent months hyping the fact that I, as a privileged On Demand customer, have the benefit of watching shows a week before they premiere. As previously mentioned, I have been trained not to care when shows are actually scheduled. But I am a product of a consumer society; I absorb advertising, and my antennae quiver angrily if I feel it is false advertising.
Therefore, when I attempt to watch a show on Monday evening, and am told that I cannot watch it for another week, I am miffed. Had you not spent months harping about how I am a privileged On Demand customer, I would not particularly care. Had you not made me, selectively, a privileged On Demand customer, I would not care. I would not even notice if shows were not available On Demand until after their regular premiere. But I assure you, I have noticed that I must wait two weeks between episodes of The Wire.
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We were ready to storm ON DEMAND too. Quite disappointing.