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STEM / STEAM: How Watching Movies Has Changed Over the Years

movie generations

This is 2026 and the technology choices for us to watch movies is dizzying!  

It was not always that way.

A bit of history..

This article was posted originally on TechyMike.com in October 2015!

I don’t want to start too far back, but, in the past 30 or 40 years there has been a remarkable technological shift in the way we watch movies (and TV shows, etc).

When I was a kid, there were two choices:

  • Go to the movie theater in Downtown Bay Shore, NY
  • Gather the family in front of the TV for “Saturday Night at the Movies”

Eventually we started going to the Drive-in on Sunrise Highway and then the Mall.  But, by that time I had grown up and left.

old vhs recorder

Not much changed for many years, but, the advent of the VHS video recorder changed our lives. Now “Saturday Night at the Movies” (and other shows) could be recorded and watched any time that suited our schedule.

Wow!

Lori’s dad had a VHS recorder just like the one in the picture (the remote was at the end of a long wire)…he recorded the Olympics one year.  It was awesome!

Then came movies on VHS tapes. You could buy them, stick them in the VHS Recorder and play a movie!  

Double wow!

A few years passed with those three options:

  • Movie Theater
  • Movies on TV
  • VHS Recorder / Player

But……technology marches on.

Eventually, a new technology was introduced: The DVD player.  Now movies are on a CD like disc that offered better quality, and longer life than the VHS tapes.

We now have four choices.

  • Movie Theater
  • Movies on TV
  • VHS Recorder / Player
  • DVD player

Again technology marches on.

The DVD movie quality took a major leap forward with HDTV (see my blog on our first HDTV) and Blu-Ray (see my blogs on the battle to win the high def DVD war) DVD.

But, we still only had 4 choices, even though the quality took a bump for the better.

  • Movie Theater
  • Movies on TV (better quality with HDTV)
  • VHS Recorder / Player (fading fast…)
  • DVD player (Standard or Blu-Ray)
my-vudu

One day, I spotted an announcement for a radically new way to watch movies: via streaming over the Internet.  Note: By now my home had “high speed” internet.  So I wrote to VUDU, told them what I did (TechyMike.com), and in a few days was rewarded with the single most exciting technology I had seen in years!  The VUDU box that allowed us to view movies via the Internet.  

Triple wow!

I immediately saw the value. This is what I wrote when I reviewed the VUDU in this blog from 2008:

Goodbye, Blockbuster and Netflix. It’s been nice knowing you, DVD. Watch your back, Blu-Ray. There is a new kid in town, and that new kid is about to change the world. That new kid is VUDU.

How right was I?  Well, I was RIGHT as RAIN!

Of course, VUDU eventually had it’s competition and Netflix streaming boomed first as the most popular, but, VUDU was the first to stream video over the Internet and nothing can change that.

Now we had FIVE ways to watch movies

  • Movie Theater
  • Movies on TV (better quality with HDTV)
  • VHS Recorder / Player (fading fast…)
  • DVD player (Standard or Blu-Ray)
  • Streaming video via the Internet (multiple options)

…..and the steep uptick in the number of options was about to begin….most of them via streaming over the Internet.

Updated: October 2015 (Still valid in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026). A long time, yikes! 🙂

Lori just came to me and asked me if I heard of “CinemaNow”.  Ah, no, actually.

My brain is finding it hard to keep up with the number of ways we can watch movies today in 2026. Most of them streaming….but, hey, way back in 2008, with VUDU, I was RIGHT!  🙂

For my movie reviews on ForCarol.com we now have a zillion choices (we have Xfinity Internet working at 500+ Mbps download to watch movies in glorious 4k on our 65 inch Sony TV with amazing Bose sound system).

Among them:

  • Movie Theaters (going away)
  • TV (love the commercials….sic)
  • VHS Recorder / Player (fading fast…)
  • DVD Blue-Ray or Standard DVD
  • DVR…..Digital Video Recording….did I miss this above?
  • Streaming video via the Internet (just a few listed):

And a lot of these can be controlled via my Pixel 10 Pro XL or Lori’s iPhone 17 Pro Max…..

Quadruple wow!

🙂

Conclusion

Streaming boomed during the pandemic and now….movie theaters are struggling. Sadly, they, may shrink or even disappear. We will see….or, rather, YOU will see. 🙂

It’s fun, loving technology since I was a kid (when George Washington was President!) and willing to embrace and keep learning about the latest technologies.

Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math ROCK!

This article was posted originally here in October 2015!

Geek on!

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