ABSTRACT
During the mid-1980s the video cassette recorders (VCR) a key element of Stage V, became one of the fastest-selling domestic appliances in history. The VCR has modified television's aspect as a calendrical and instantaneous medium that can schedule human activity. Stage V technology permits people to have much more control over television and to be more interactive with it. Using VCRs actively and creatively, Americans a mass collections of films by favorite actors and collect all the epiosodes of Star Trek. The students in the author's current seminar, "Television, Society, and Culture", bring examples of programs they are analyzing to class, so that others can view them and offer commentary, interpretations, and advice. The VCR also affects their use of theatrical films. People can watch varied fare at home. This includes X-rated movies, previously accessible only in seedy movie houses, which the VCR is also helping, destroy. Television is fundamental in an electronic, statistical, information-loaded, consumer society.
