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Comment by taeric

7 years ago

I think the point is that my children will likely never know what a television tuned to a dead channel looks like. I've almost forgotten, myself.

I say that as someone that finds that line rather nice.

9 comments

taeric

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SuperPaintMan  7 years ago

You reminded me of a post JWZ made a while back with a TV in his bar. It's neat how these things can be embedded into our collective experince.

(Copy and paste the link, referrer shenanigans.) https://www.jwz.org/blog/2012/01/snow-crash-simulated/

  • taeric  7 years ago

    I didn't realize newer televisions simulated the static. That is rather amusing, in many ways.

    Also, thanks for mentioning the copy/paste referrer nonsense. Didn't realize they blocked referred links from here and was curious what the reference was for a time. :)

InternetOfStuff  7 years ago

> I say that as someone that finds that line rather nice.

It is a very nice line.

However, it's dated to the point of losing its meaning.

Like rotary phones :-)

notheruser  7 years ago

A television tuned to a dead channel looks like the HBO logo... A quick google search said it was still in use as of 2015.

  • taeric  7 years ago

    What? I was assuming it meant a static "white noise" image. And... yeah, I remember them happening. But in modern transmission systems, that is a complete fabrication. There is nothing about getting white noise to transmit to look like that, and it in fact takes more effort to create such a screen.

    Last television I hooked up using a digital antenna would simply not show anything if the signal didn't exist. If you had poor signal, you'd get more compression artifacts. Nothing there should translate to the white noise image.

    Right?