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Name some things entertainment wise you once enjoyed but no longer exist...


One I thought of the other night was how radios (old ones and even AM/FM receivers) would emit light and cause this nighttime glow in the dark. I even remember at one time taping a strip of cardboard over the radio dial area of a huge receiver I once had because it was too bright.

Or when stacking a bunch of 45s or LPs on a turntable and the relief that two or three, or the entire remaining stack, didn't drop instead of just one record or LP at a time.

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Those were the BSR record players.

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Back in my "single days," about 25 years ago, I lived not too far from a place called "Putt-Putt." It had two miniature golf courses and outdoor batting cages for both baseball and softball. I had a lot of fun there, but the place closed some years back and it now belongs to the ages. I still miss it from time to time.

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I heard of a place called The ‘Butt Hutt’ which was a boarding house for gays, sounds similar.

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You "heard" about it? Did you happen to visit this place?

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Negatory

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The traditional holiday season, when everything wasn't all about profit. Back when:
• You didn't see Halloween candy displays in stores in mid-July. There was virtually no mention of Halloween before October 1. People did not send greeting cards for Halloween.
• Thanksgiving in the U.S. meant a four-day weekend. "Black Friday" was industry jargon used by insiders. Stores held After-Thanksgiving Sales (still the proper term) and the retailers didn't constantly beat everyone over the head with it. Now we are bombarded with this "Black Friday" rubbish beginning in October. It's ironic that a holiday dedicated to giving thanks for what we have has been supplanted by the manufactured need for more, more, more.
• Radio stations didn't start broadcasting "Christmas" music in November. You would hear the occasional holiday tune in December. A couple of stations in my area would switch to a 24-hour format at noon on Christmas Eve and run commercial-free until midnight of Christmas Day.
I would like to know who came up with the idea of all-day "Christmas" music starting in November, and why. By the time Christmas arrives everyone is so sick of this stuff. I've actually heard people say they will be glad when the holidays are over. How sad.
• Christmas TV specials like Rudolph could only be seen once a year. Just like the annual airing of The Wizard of Oz, these broadcasts were special events. Home video and now streaming services have ruined this. These programs lost their "magic" once they could be viewed on demand.

All of this cheapens the experience of what should be a special time of year. Yes, there has always been commercialization of holidays. But there is no longer any balance. Materialism, greed and crass consumerism have become the dominant driving forces.

Save the holiday season.

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Ah, you and I have similar thoughts about holiday seasons. I just read that it is now felt that July 5th is the kickoff to the Halloween season.

Also, I've noticed with the changes in the Christmas holiday season that the intensity of that season is not what it used to be because it has become so diluted by the extension of shopping days.

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All of this overkill has ruined this special time of year. Another thing that is completely ludicrous is the Hallmark Channel with it's "Christmas in July" programming. Who wants to watch Christmas movies in the middle of the miserable summer heat?
The old adage "too much of a good thing" is true. And it's sad that all of this excess has nothing to do with the desire for a longer holiday season. It's all about profit, nothing else.

Save the holiday season.

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I'm all in favor of doorbuster Black Friday shopping going away. Covid is one of the big things that finally killed.

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COVID-19 put a stop to the "open on Thanksgiving Day" nonsense. One of the few positives of the pandemic.

Save the holiday season.

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It didn't really change anything with the Holiday Season. More people are shopping online over buying in retail stores.

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Here is another......eating horribly sweet cereal with Saturday cartoons and waiting until wrestling at noon (and where wrestling fans would curse local broadcasters when Saturday wrestling was pre-empted with things like spelling bees or bowling or some other interrupting local event.
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Renting movies at video stores.

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Big one for me too.

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Okay, those were very fun times👍

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Buying a video game that didn't require endless patches and came with a nifty manual.

Visiting an arcade that was just an arcade and not adjacent to a movie theatre or restaurant.

Going to a midnight double features at the local second run theatre.

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Ma and Pa movie rental stores.

I could spend an hour looking for movies to rent.

Blockbuster was something I experienced after 2002. It was nowhere as interesting as the store in my hometown.

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And how you had to go back again and again to try and snatch the latest popular release.

Or how, in these rental places, copies of the movie would be behind the video box/sleeve and the disappointment when none were left.

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I never had an issue with the latest or popular movies.

I usually saw them in theater or waited a year.

Patience is a virtue in a rural community.

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I was a teen when the first video/VCR/beta machine rentals started and became popular. First, there was one business doing this, and then shortly later a second opened after it was realized how popular such a store became.

We would go in and rent either a VCR or Beta machine and then videos of a limited supply. Also, back then, a movie on VCR tape was around ninety dollars.

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Good quality movies/tv shows with good acting and good writing?

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I couldn't have stated it any better.

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What TV do you like?

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Check out Sons Of Anarchy, Peaky Blinders, Ozark or Better Call Saul. I really loved those shows!

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They are out there if one is willing to look. With streaming, world wide quality programing is available and especially if one has no issue with subtitles or dubbing.

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I'm actually considering giving foreign films made in more recent times a try. From what I've observed, many countries have gotten better quality cameras and filming techniques compared to before the millennium. Can't say much on the story-telling, but it's interesting seeing how it affects film-makers overseas. My only issue is, I find subtitles distracting and you have to have your eyes on the screen at all times, or you miss dialogue. I find dubbing easier, despite the lips not matching up.

There is one area of AI that I would find amazingly useful, and this has been proposed, though there's legal issues at the moment, and I suspect the software hasn't gotten to that point yet. The idea was, you could have a computer "listen" to a film in one language (doesn't matter what year it came out either) and the computer could actually create copies of the voices of the actors on screen (doesn't even matter if they're dead) and have them "speak" in another language in a much more sophisticated form of dubbing. Can't guarantee they can fix the lip movements issue, though that might be included too, but it's an amazing idea to think about. You could finally watch old "Godzilla" films with the actors speaking "English" with "their own voices!" Or foreigners could watch American films without crappy dubbing, subtitles, or the actors having to do lines in other languages while filming! Isn't that awesome?

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