What would Honey Boo Boo think?
Digital video recorders are leaving a diary-like track record of people’s guiltiest television viewing pleasures — and it’s not something everyone’s proud to share.
“I’m embarrassed to have ‘Real Housewives of New Jersey’ [on there]. I don’t feel like it’s bettering the world,” said Aimee Ableman, a 39-year-old East Village mom. “As a nation, we’re getting dumber and these reality shows don’t help. I just found out about ‘[Here Comes] Honey Boo Boo,’ and I would never put that on my TiVo.”
As the devices have transformed television for the growing legions of “watch when we want to” viewers, some say they’ve become a kind of extension of their owners’ selves — laying bare likes, dislikes, incongruities and guilty pleasures.
“When you go over to someone’s house and you look at their playlist, it’s kind of personal — it really opens your eyes into who the person is. It’s kind of like what they’re about, what makes them tick,” said Greg DePalma, vice president of audience insights at TiVo. “My wife is a professional writer and likes to think she watches TV for education and highbrow — but there’s the ‘Real Housewives of Orange County’ on there, too.”
As much as television DVR playlists can reveal about a person, sometimes they mask what’s really going on.
Katy Westcott says her DVR seems like it belongs to two different people: the TV watcher she’d like to be, and the one she really is.
“Some things I’m really good at watching, and then there’s other shows I feel I should watch and I DVR and I end up clogging the whole thing up,” said Westcott, 33, of Pawtucket, RI.
“I kind of am obsessive about things in short phases — I decide I should watch every ‘How It’s Made’ and find out how things get made,” she said. “I did watch some of them, but then something like ‘Glee’ will be in there and I’ll watch that instead.”
As for the guilty viewing habits exposed by some DVRs, not everyone necessarily feels guilty about them.
“I have the whole season of ‘Duck Dynasty’ on DVR. It’s ridiculous seeing mountain people’s way of living,” said East Village advertising staffer Mark Donohue, 25. “[But] I don’t try to hide it. It’s just a bad show.”
Additional reporting by Amber Sutherland