Anyone who remembers watching TV during the 1980s and 1990s probably recalls sports magazine ads where you can get a “free” sports bloopers video with a one year subscription to the magazine. Of course, these bloopers videos were only available in VHS, and you had to wait about two months to receive it, if you were silly enough to fall for the campaign. Well, perhaps that is not fair, for when you think back to the 1980s, there was no internet, no digital or on demand cable, and, honestly, one can only sit through so much of those annoying Sportscenter guys. And when you also consider that it was during the 1980s that athletes began to “earn” insane 20 million dollar contracts, who could pass up the opportunity to watch them fall flat on their faces?
Today, if we want to see funny video there are about a thousand different sites where you can do that, instantly. Certainly, for all of the “millenials,” who were practically born with brains wired for WiFi access, they find it laughable that watching funny sports videos required older generations to rent a VHS tape, subscribe to S.I., or wait for MTV to play “Walk of Life” by Dire Straits. What do we do now? We go online and search “funny sports video” and receive about 5 million hits of outrageousness, which ranges from the family friendly to those that probably are not suitable for children.
The ease with which folks can access funny sports videos, new video, television shows, and even recent blockbuster movies makes you wonder how this is going to affect the television and film industries. What it probably means, as we are finding out, is people waiting through longer and longer advertisements that are impossible to skip. Still, any commercial is worth it for the chance to see a home run bounce ofs the head of Jose Canseco. Actually, seeing, alone, would be well worth a two year subscription to S.I.!