Has the DVR ruined television? Let me make something clear here: I am a frequent DVR user, and I have fallen victim to watching my favorite weekly shows days after they originally aired. But by having the convenience to watch whenever we want, have we completely annihilated TV culture?

Back in the 90s every Thursday night you would make sure you were done with dinner by eight so that you could watch Friends and Seinfeld on NBC. Back in the 50s every Monday night every family in America would be watching I Love Lucy. TV used to require being in your house at a certain time. Sure, the DVR allows us to watch shows that we may not have been able to watch, but are we taking the wholesomeness out of television?

Watching a series used to mean something. It required a fairly high amount of commitment. Every show you watched, you became passionate about because watching a show required you to plan your schedule around its airing time. This created an unmatched love and obsession for shows. There were no such thing as fake fans; viewers had an intense love for the shows they watched. The only fans a show had were the committed ones who would watch every single week on a certain day and time. By recording shows, it is easy to fall behind and eventually loose interest. Without the possibility of recording a show it insured for a devoted fan base that was very much involved in the show.

It also used to be more of an experience to watch every week. It was exciting to rush to the television at a certain time every night to see your favorite show. Or rush home so that you wouldn’t miss the resolution to the big cliffhanger from last week. You also knew that if you didn’t see an episode, it was unlikely you were going to be able to watch it at all. One of the best examples of this was Saturday Night Live. The live sketch comedy show started airing every Saturday at 11:30pm in the 70s. For a child especially, it was exhilarating to stay up late and laugh at a PG-13 show. It was cool to stay up late and watch, knowing that this was your only chance to watch this specific episode. But some of the pizazz is taken out of SNL when you press play on Sunday morning.

The DVR has also created a new problem. By recording shows, the amount of viewers for a show goes down, which gives the network a false idea of how many people watch the show every week. This has created serious issues in the TV world. Popular shows are being canceled because of low viewer numbers, when really most of their fans are watching them the next day on their DVR. For example, there have been talks about canceling popular Fox shows The Mindy Project and Brooklyn Nine-Nine starring Andy Samberg. Fans have created an uproar on social media, saving the shows, at least for the time being. This problem arises from the targeted fan base for most of these shows. The show is written to appeal to teens and young adults. Most of who are likely busy with schoolwork on a weeknight.

The new issue that has arisen from the invention of the DVR is whether or not TV itself needs to change. Should shows be written differently knowing that they will not be watched necessarily with the appropriate spacing between episodes? Now that TV watching is more casual, does that change the quality of the show? Television shows have followed the same mold since its invention, but perhaps the increased technology calls for a new mold to be made. Casual watching is a much more likely occurrence now a days, so should shows with elaborate plots and numerous characters with confusing conflicts cease to exist?

With the DVR television has become more of an after thought. It is now unlikely to have fans that could quote an episode the day after it came out. Following a television series used to entail the same passion and devotion of rooting for a sports team. TV is now watched on the weekends, or to fill some time. No longer is it something anyone races home to watch. While increasing its convenience it has also effectively changed the culture of television. Only time will tell whether or not this is a good thing.