In the USA, TV is king – Statista figures predict that this year adults will spend around three hours each day watching the box. While traditional TV viewing is becoming less common as smartphone viewing becomes more popular, streaming services are coming to the fore, ballooning in popularity by 25% in five years according to statistics.
All this shows that televisions will retain pride of place in our lounges for some time yet, but what does the future look like for TVs? Read on to learn where we’ve got to – and where we’re headed.
A brief history of TV
Amazingly, television technology has been around since the mid-1800s when inventors devised methods of mechanically scanning images. This resulted in the development of photoconductive selenium devices like the Nipkow disk which could display a huge 18 lines of image resolution!
In the early 1900s, Boris Rosing and AA. Campbell-Swinton created a device from a cathode ray tube and mechanical scanner; the basis of which was used by Philo Farnsforth to make the first electronic television in 1927. Scottish inventor John Baird made the first color TV transmission the following year, when the world’s first TV station was launched, WRGB in Schenectady, New York.
The world of these early pioneers allowed television to rapidly grow in rapidly, becoming one of the hallmark inventions of the 20th century. Digital TVs came next, growing in popularity in the 1990s and reaching the mainstream in the late 2000s, followed by high-definition services in the 2010s.
What features will we see from next-gen TVs?
The next generation of televisions are set to deliver a range of exciting features and benefits which may well change the very nature of viewing itself.
- Higher definition – TV manufacturers have been on a mission to increase the definition of screens for decades now, and this is certain to continue. The electronic components found within the technology are set to become more complex as designers incorporate new display technologies like Sony’s Crystal LED display – offering up to 16K of resolution. If you think 4K is crisp, just you wait!
- Part of the furniture – While ever-larger screens have boosted the viewing experience, it has meant that our lounges have become dominated by the TV. However, as foldable technology becomes cheaper, we’ll see TVs that you can unfurl when viewing and roll away when not, removing what some see as an eyesore.
- Holographic TV – While real-life holographs aren’t exactly the same as Star Wars, companies like Looking Glass Factory are developing 8K holographic screens that display 45 image positions that vary depending on where you’re viewing from!
- AR TV – Augmented reality glasses overlay images onto the real world, but they haven’t had the smoothest introduction. Nevertheless, with companies like Apple entering the AR and VR game, perhaps soon we’ll see TV services offering up augmented reality viewing – who needs a TV anyway!
TV has changed immensely over the years, and that breakneck change is set to continue. What do you want to see from a future TV? Let us know in the comments section.