Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Obituary for the VCR

Hearing reports of the the death of the vcr is quite sad for me. I remember our first vcr that my family bought in the mid 80s. That thing was a beast. It must have weighed at least 50 pounds, but what a world it opened for me. The notion that one could tape a show now and then watch it later was absolutely mind blowing. So great. But now that times have moved forward and DVR and DVR have overtaken the video world, I find myself saddened. Don't get me wrong, the DVR has changed my life in so many ways (although that is depressing to admit)... and pretty much all for the better. I will miss the VCR, but not too much - with the exception of one reason.

Here is what I will miss about the vcr. I will miss the taping. What I mean is this. Television has a wealth of resources that could be valuable in the history classroom. Whereas in the past, I could pop in a tape, press record and 30 to 60 minutes later, I would have lesson plan gold. Now, I don't really have a way of transferring a documentary from home to school. It bugs me. How can I successfully move video from home to school?

Well, here is my solution...

My hope is that some day the following is a reality. With the impending merging of cable television and high speed internet. I would hope that someday I would be able to tape a show at my house on my home DVR and then be able to send that show to the DVR (or other machine) in my classroom. I guess it kinds of works like email. The main obstacle I see revolves around having machines have the same cable providers. Then I can have the current events and other documentaries at school for my students to enjoy.

Please someone, make this happen, but until it does, I will mourn and feel sad that the VCR is dead.

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