Watching TV onboard

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Didn't expect some of these replies. I'm absolutely unapologetic about wanting to watch some of my favorite shows while on the boat at night. I read plenty of books as well. For what it's worth, I'm currently reading 'The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of Nuclear War Planner'.

Ironically, I NEVER, EVER watch the news on TV. In fact, I avoid it like the plague. I much prefer to read the news online so I can choose what to pay attention to rather than watch the news channels loop their sensationalized doom and gloom all day long.

And I'm not a big drinker, so don't do much of that on the boat.

Everything in moderation...
 
Moonfish,
If you still have this we are interested.
We live in Puyallup WA. Shoot me a pm

Joe

Moonfish said:
I have an older (non-HD) KVH Trac-Vision satellite system that we took off the boat. The previous owner used it for DirecTV, but we never did. If you find yourself up in my neck of the PNW woods I'll sell it to you for $300.
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RT Firefly said:
Greetings,
If you can't stay away from anchors when aboard, you're adrift! Tie up to a dock, crack that book and put on Oprah!

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Mr RT, that could be PRESIDENT Oprah.:eek:
 
HaHa I watch TV.
Never on my boat though. Mostly all news and related material.
Planing to ditch Direct TV when I runs out. We’re on a sat disc.

foggy,
You mean like not hang it on the bow? Will soon comply.

Scratch,
I’m very much against drinking too.
Sugar and alcohol .. very bad.

Scott,
Stream .... wazzatt?

RT,
Great. Lots of books are mindless stuff like most TV but much much better choices as to what to expose one’s self to. There’s millions of books w far better content than all of TV.

Seevee,
Haven’t found another boating forum worth watching. I’ve got two or 3 on my FB that I’m about to get rid of. Guys are building boats out there w wood from the hardware store and don’t even know what it is.

aboatman,
I definitely don’t have a TV on my boat. And I never go to McDonnalds. Ever.

Boomerang,
Who cares when there’s something interesting to see or discuss about some other anchor. And there’s lots and lots best anchors here. Say something good about some anchor and almost immediately someone will say “well what about the ___. Whatever anchor he has.
And re the 14 thousand I remember when Marin Fare got close to 10000. Years ago. I thought to myself “G*d, that guy needs to get a life”. Also I’m shy of 14000 ... haha. But I’ve been on TF for ten years.
 
Spare me Oprah. No Barista’s either.

Michael,
Good for you!
W/O TV 45 would not be president and the Republicans would not be far far to the right and the liberals would not need to be called socialists. Americans would almost all be very close to the middle and easily be able to negotiate most anything. In this case I vote to go back in time. But W/O TV there would be no need. And all the right and left stuff would be on the same newscast.
But if everybody didn’t watch TV ..........
 
Nomad Willy said:
There’s millions of books w far better content than all of TV.
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129,864,880 books so would hope some good ones. However, the condemnation of all of TV is rather shallow.

Is Food Channel worse than all the recipe books?

National Geographic and the History channel no good?

What about the Hallmark Channel?

I assume you don't approve of movies either so all the movie channels are no good, from TNT to HMO to Cinemax to Showtime to Epic to Starz to The Movie Channel and all the rest? Even though many of the movies from books.

The Travel Channel also no good?

Comedy Channel? Do we dismiss comedy as no good? Personally, I like some mindless drivel even.

All the dozens of stations of music bad too?

I guess Disney and the Family Channel and Nickolodeon hold no value?

27 Religious networks currently, no good?

It's amazing to me that with 400 or so channels today, one can honestly say that none of it is any good.
 
I started another thread “TV is Bad”
It’s on Harbor Chat.
Trying to avoid a hyjack.
 
Aw c'mon Willy. Let's keep the d*mned politics out of this OK? If anyone wants TVs, books or dancing girls on board what the hell does it matter?

Just saw your post #67. NOT hard to guess where that one is going...Sheesh!
 
Nomad Willy said:
Spare me Oprah. No Barista’s either.

Michael,
Good for you!
W/O TV 45 would not be president and the Republicans would not be far far to the right and the liberals would not need to be called socialists. Americans would almost all be very close to the middle and easily be able to negotiate most anything. In this case I vote to go back in time. But W/O TV there would be no need. And all the right and left stuff would be on the same newscast.
But if everybody didn’t watch TV ..........
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No judgement here, but that's an entirely different TV from what I watch. I'm exclusively watching sports, movies on iTunes and original series on Netflix and HBO. All of which has very little to do with the effects of TV you referenced. Certainly far removed from shows like The Apprentice or news stations closely aligned to the right or left.

Anyways, I don't want to come across as defensive, as I really don't feel that I need to be. However, I do want to point out that I don't believe all TV is created equal. One could say the same about books. In fact, there are plenty of books out there that push the right and left further toward the edges.
 
Well said Michael,
But sports and lots of movies are divisive also. Do you ever root for both teams?

And books rarely start riots and protests. Not enough people read them.

RT,
It went to Harbor Chat. And I’m not going to comment any more here.
 
MichaelB1969 said:
No judgement here, but that's an entirely different TV from what I watch. I'm exclusively watching sports, movies on iTunes and original series on Netflix and HBO. All of which has very little to do with the effects of TV you referenced. Certainly far removed from shows like The Apprentice or news stations closely aligned to the right or left.

Anyways, I don't want to come across as defensive, as I really don't feel that I need to be. However, I do want to point out that I don't believe all TV is created equal. One could say the same about books. In fact, there are plenty of books out there that push the right and left further toward the edges.
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I'll be defensive for you then. You asked about television options. Then members chose to attack you and anyone else so low as to actually like to watch television. Sounded to me though like he'd watched a lot to be so bothered by it. I quite imagine the same person who calls in daily to a talk show to tell the host how horrible the show is and why no one listens to it.

We enjoy television and make no apologies for it. It's important to us to be able to watch it on the boat. Last night we watched several hours of basketball. We had great seats, better than any in the arena. There were 11 of us present. That would have cost us from $250 to $10,000 to watch in the arena. Comparatively our Directv subscription isn't so bad. (Yes, about four times a year we do rent a suite at the Miami Heat games-now that may be insane, but we have fun).

In addition to sports, I enjoy Shark Tank and The Profit. Oh, and we do occasionally watch Live PD on A&E, much better than Cops. We don't just watch for educational purposes, we like entertainment and we find very different things to be entertaining in their own way. We watched the early years of American Idol. We've watched a lot of television shows keeping up with the deplorable conditions faced by the ignored Americans in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, insight not available anywhere else. Even watched Marcus Lemonis's trips to Puerto Rico. We also listen to a lot of music on television and we catch travel shows to places that interest us. And occasionally some outrageous comedy.

See, we're multi-faceted people who have varied interests and make no apologies for any of them. At night while many here might be on their aft deck having a few beers, we might be relaxing with ice cream and water in front of a television. Neither right or wrong, just different personal choices.
 
As to watching TV on my boat ...

If I actually had a good signal I’d probably watch weather and news on my i-pad.

But I’m certianly not going to pay big money for it.
 
I follow those whom I find interesting.
 

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We read our books on screens, Kindle and iPad, is that TV?
 
Thread drift? Too late.


We can all debate whether TV or 100 other forms of personal entertainment for that matter are worthwhile (as they're doing now on Nomad's other thread), but I think some of the TV defenders are missing a key part of the question or reaction from the anti-tv posters. Whether you think TV is profoundly worthwhile or noisy mind-mush, why would you be inclined to stare into a glowing screen on a boat, when you could do it just as well or probably more comfortably in your living room and save a billion dollars in boat costs? It's the same question I think of when I watch teenagers surfing their phones while standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon.
 
kthoennes said:
Thread drift? Too late.


We can all debate whether TV or 100 other forms of personal entertainment for that matter are worthwhile (as they're doing now on Nomad's other thread), but I think some of the TV defenders are missing a key part of the question or reaction from the anti-tv posters. Whether you think TV is profoundly worthwhile or noisy mind-mush, why would you be inclined to stare into a glowing screen on a boat, when you could do it just as well or probably more comfortably in your living room and save a billion dollars in boat costs? It's the same question I think of when I watch teenagers surfing their phones while standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon.
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I think you're missing something too. Why is it an either / or? If I'm on a weekend or week long cruise, how am I supposed to get back to my living room to watch TV at nights when docked?
 
why would you be inclined to stare into a glowing screen on a boat, when you could do it just as well or probably more comfortably in your living room and save a billion dollars in boat costs?
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In our case, because the boat was our home. One of the first upgrades we made when we bought it was to install a KVH satellite system. Ann is the big TV watcher in our family, but I was glad we did it.

For a weekend or vacation boat, TV would be a very low priority. Doubtful we would go to any expense to install it if not already there.
 
kthoennes said:
Thread drift? Too late.


We can all debate whether TV or 100 other forms of personal entertainment for that matter are worthwhile (as they're doing now on Nomad's other thread), but I think some of the TV defenders are missing a key part of the question or reaction from the anti-tv posters. Whether you think TV is profoundly worthwhile or noisy mind-mush, why would you be inclined to stare into a glowing screen on a boat, when you could do it just as well or probably more comfortably in your living room and save a billion dollars in boat costs? It's the same question I think of when I watch teenagers surfing their phones while standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon.
Click to expand...

Your analogy doesn't make sense. In the TV example you say it is a cost and comfort issue of doing it on the boat vs. living room. With the phone example, you are saying they should be looking at nature vs. having their heads in a phone. Which is the equivalent of saying that someone on a boat should look at the natural environment vs. a TV. Your examples don't pattern match.

That said, the answer is very simple. It's because sometimes I'd prefer to stay on the boat instead of in my living room, and when doing so, I wouldn't mind watching something on the TV.

And in terms of saving boat costs, I don't really see much cost involved. I have a spot for a TV. A decent TV in the size that would fit the space would run around $170. It is already pre-wired. If my existing Unlimited LTE connection and AppleTV solution worked, the cost is only that of the TV ($170) and AppleTV ($199). And I could probably get away with something like a Chromecast for less than half the amount of the AppleTV.

So not sure where the $1B comes in. I will say that it isn't worth it for me if I have to buy satellite equipment for thousands of dollars. Nor do I want to bother with a local antenna since I don't watch network TV except when my teams might be on locally (but I am a Boston sports fan, so other than the Patriots playoff runs, local TV typically doesn't carry the games I want to watch).

My retirement boat on which we'll do long distance cruising, yes, I'd pay for the satellite gear. But not this boat, which is primarily for weekend day cruises and occasional overnight trips. Or occasional overnights at the marina, in which case having the TV would be a "nice to have" but not a "must have".
 
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kthoennes said:
Thread drift? Too late.

We can all debate whether TV or 100 other forms of personal entertainment for that matter are worthwhile (as they're doing now on Nomad's other thread), but I think some of the TV defenders are missing a key part of the question or reaction from the anti-tv posters. Whether you think TV is profoundly worthwhile or noisy mind-mush, why would you be inclined to stare into a glowing screen on a boat, when you could do it just as well or probably more comfortably in your living room and save a billion dollars in boat costs? It's the same question I think of when I watch teenagers surfing their phones while standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon.
Click to expand...

 
kthoennes said:
why would you be inclined to stare into a glowing screen on a boat, when you could do it just as well or probably more comfortably in your living room and save a billion dollars in boat costs? .
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Wifey B: Because I'm in Key West tonight and headed west from here. After we have dinner and walk around Duval Street, then we'll head back to the boat. We may all gather in the salon and watch some tv or hubby and I may head to our stateroom and, among other things, we may watch some before going to sleep. The Heat don't play tonight but a couple of games on TNT. :)
 
My apology.
As BandB points out there’s lots of good TV.
I should have mentioned that.
TV itself isn’t bad. It’s the stuff on the programs. And people should be smart enough to make good choices. And I thought people would assume I was talking about the bad stuff. Dosn’t look like it from here though. Wish I could take the whole thread back.
All I can do is say I’m sorry.

We’ve done this before about watching TV on boats. We’re so used to being extreeemy politically devided that it’s spilled over into most everything. Somebody says something opinionated (like I did) and bang .... everybody runs for the correct corner and starts fighting. Like 45 says .... sad.
 
once again, part time boaters forget there are liveaboards and long distance cruisers who get their fair share of nature, solitude boating, reading, etc.... but still like some TV to round things out....let alone hear what is going on in the world past internet news...if they are even getting the net.

for every boater here on TF, there is another completely the opposite...niether right or wrong.
 
kthoennes said:
Thread drift? Too late.


We can all debate whether TV or 100 other forms of personal entertainment for that matter are worthwhile (as they're doing now on Nomad's other thread), but I think some of the TV defenders are missing a key part of the question or reaction from the anti-tv posters. Whether you think TV is profoundly worthwhile or noisy mind-mush, why would you be inclined to stare into a glowing screen on a boat, when you could do it just as well or probably more comfortably in your living room and save a billion dollars in boat costs? It's the same question I think of when I watch teenagers surfing their phones while standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon.
Click to expand...
We live on a boat. What say you to folks like we?
 
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