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Time - Man of the Year
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Time_Man_of_the_Year_Compact_Publishing_3YX-Disc-1_Compact_Publishing_1993.iso
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1993-04-08
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6KB
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113 lines
VIDEO, Page 67Can Anybody Work This Thing?
New gadgets keep arriving to try to cure VCR illiteracy. The
latest lets people simply talk to their machine.
By RICHARD ZOGLIN -- With reporting by Patrick E. Cole/Los
Angeles and William Tynan/New York
Peter Jennings can't do it. Neither can Katie Couric. Tom
Brokaw at least gives it a try. "Yes, I can program my VCR," he
says, "but only for the 1956 version of What's My Line?"
Tipper Gore hasn't even figured out how to set the clock;
she finally had to cover it with black masking tape to hide the
relentless blinking -- 12:00/12:00/12:00 -- that is the
unmistakable sign of a VCR illiterate. Barbara Walters has three
VCRs and can't program any of them. "I'm reduced to asking
friends to tape for me," she says. "I am deeply ashamed."
Ashamed, perhaps, but hardly alone. The dirty little
secret of the VCR age is that almost nobody can work the darn
thing -- at least for anything besides plunking in a movie from
the corner video store. Much of the befuddlement,
understandably, afflicts older folks who have never really
cottoned to the computer age. But many younger, technology-savvy
people also seem utterly defeated by the maze of buttons and
pages of instructions. Authoritative statistics are not
available, but estimates are that as many as 80% of all VCR
owners have never learned how to set their machines to record
a program.
The situation has given rise to a new industry: devising
still more elaborate technology to make VCR operation less
daunting. Two years ago, Gemstar Development Corp. introduced
VCR Plus+, a remote control-size gadget that simplifies
programming by assigning each show a code of one to eight
digits. The user punches in the code numbers, which instantly
program the VCR to record at the proper time and channel. Sales
of VCR Plus+ have reached about 6 million worldwide, and 600
U.S. newspapers, along with TV Guide, now carry the code numbers
in their TV listings. The device is being incorporated into some
new VCRs. "I'm not mechanically inclined," says TV producer Dick
Clark, a VCR Plus+ enthusiast. "But you just punch in the
numbers, and it makes you feel like a genius."
Now comes an even more sophisticated effort to tame the
VCR. The VCR Voice Programmer, a voice-activated remote-control
device being launched nationally this week by Voice Powered
Technology, eliminates button pushing almost entirely. Just bark
commands into the microphone -- channel number, day, time -- and
the machine does your bidding. A viewer can call out commands
for a variety of other VCR functions as well, from "rewind" to
"zap it" (whiz through the commercials).
These programming devices, of course, are hardly
hassle-free. VCR Plus+ must be programmed in advance before it
can respond to the codes, not a simple process. (Ken Sander, who
hosts a New York City cable show and dubs himself "the Cable
Doctor," will do the job for confused viewers in a $45 house
call.) The VCR Voice Programmer is also complicated to set up
(it must be trained to recognize the user's voice) and costs a
hefty $169, nearly as much as some low-priced VCRs. The device
is being sold only through a toll-free mail-order number
(800-788-0800), to avoid further markup in stores.
Why is the VCR so intimidating? One problem is the ever
changing technology, another the lack of universal standards.
Cable has complicated things enormously; with some hookups,
programming the VCR requires two separate sets of instructions
-- one for the cable converter (to switch channels), another for
the VCR (to turn on at the proper time). And even if the machine
is programmed exactly right, any one of a host of pitfalls can
scuttle the enterprise. Frustrated VCR users can recite them
through gritted teeth: forgetting to put in a cassette; failing
to turn on the timer or (on some machines) switch off the VCR;
accidentally leaving on the mute button; coming home to
discover that a presidential press conference has put the whole
evening's schedule out of whack.
To Peter McWilliams, who has written several best-selling
books about personal electronics, resistance to VCR technology
reflects the fact that "people don't care enough about it. If
it really is important enough, then we'll learn how to do it."
Compounding this is the irony that in order to master a VCR, the
defining device of the video age, one must first master a nearly
antiquated, pre-MTV skill: reading an instruction book. Says
David Dewalt, a salesman at Brands Mart in Kansas City,
Missouri: "Reading the manual is something most customers don't
understand."
The defiant ignorance voiced by many VCR-phobics may be a
sign of technology backlash. "I'm electronically incorrect,"
says Kathy Harrison of Raleigh, North Carolina, who got a VCR
for her birthday four years ago and hasn't taped a show yet. "I
don't like appliances." Or it may be merely another case of
American don't-know-how. In City Slickers, Billy Crystal spends
much of one day on the trail fruitlessly trying to explain to
Daniel Stern how to tape one show while watching another.
"He'll never get it!" cries their partner, Bruno Kirby. "It's
been four hours. The cows can tape something by now." Yes, and
those moo-activated VCRs are just around the corner.