WebTV Dazzles the Eyes of Couch Potatoes I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set I go into the other room and read a book.
�Groucho Marx
The World Wide Web has hit home. People are giving up their midnight rendezvous with the leftovers in their refrigerators for a cruise to the Microsoft/NBC Web site. They�re forsaking their beds to cradle their keyboards and send off e-mail messages until the wee hours of the morning. Beds and refrigerators all over town are getting lonely, but the TV set is the hardest hit household appliance�hands down.
Internet hobbyists and addicts found a new elixir for their cravings, and the Web has them hooked. Even former TV-heads aren�t suffering withdrawal symptoms from missing Seinfeld episodes and The Late Show with David Letterman. Should we declare the race a landslide and haul our television sets out to the dumpsters?
Not so fast. WebTV, from WebTV Networks Inc., has pumped some muscles in the good ol� standard television. With less than $400 and a telephone line, you can buy a tiny black box that enables you to view the Web on your television screen from the comfort of your couch. You can read the New York Times CyberTimes sitting in your LazyBoy chair or even send e-mail lying on your waterbed.