As a European living in the US, on the left coast in the little hamlet of San Francisco – I had to overcome my prejudice that American television was terrible. When it comes to television the BBC – for the most part – is the standard-bearer worldwide for quality television and news reporting. Though if you watch BBC America you probably wouldn’t think so (BBC America will you please stop flooding the channel with really bad, cheap reality shows?)

However, over the years I’ve come to appreciate that excellent television is produced in the US – it’s just there’s so much more bad television production required to fill the 1,000 or so channels that a person needs to look carefully for the great TV productions.

One thing that has been noticeable over the last year or so is the introduction of video conferencing and video chat on different Television programs– an attempt to honestly reflect today’s social fabric. C-Span, a cable-industry financed, non-profit network for televising sessions of the U.S. Congress and other public affairs event and policy discussions, use Skype to allow viewers to ask questions.  Oprah Winfrey signed a marketing agreement with Skype to connect with some guests on her show. While the quality has been lambasted, it shows that video chat and video conferencing entered the mainstream of consciousness some time ago. Fox News, CNN and others have also joined the group.

However, it was a recent show, Modern Family that really struck the “video chat is mainstream” chord for me.  The sitcom is an American mockumentary comedy show about three generations of one family that has the uncanny knack of getting it right about family life. A recent episode shows the family gathering around the laptop to wish Grandpa a Merry Christmas via video chat. No doubt many of us will be doing the same thing during the Christmas and holiday period as the video starts to replace the phone.

Author disclaimer: The television programs mentioned in this article are in no way a reflection of the excellent quality of TV programming the author opines about  – well apart from C-Span and Modern Family

Tags: BBC America, video chat

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