The Remote
Feb. 12th, 2006 09:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
johncomicHow many remotes do you own? [In my house there are six.]
Do any of them make a clicking sound when you press the buttons? [None of ours do; they all operate silently.]
Did you ever own a remote that clicked? [I never did.]
Remotes in comics and cartoons always click. And I know in some places, people actually refer to remotes as "clickers". So where the eff did this come from?
You see someone in a comic pointing a small non-descript object in their hand that goes "click" and you know it's a remote -- even though that object, in the very act of clicking, is acting unlike a remote.
Granted, there are lots of weird carryovers in our attitudes toward sounds. We still say that phones "ring" even though it's been years since they actually rang -- cuz they used to. Dogs never actually said "bow wow", but they do make some kinda sound, that's probably closer to "bow wow" than it is to, say, "ring ring".
But this whole idea of remotes clicking -- or even making any kind of sound at all -- we all seem to accept the idea, but why? Where did the idea come from? Is it only Canadian remotes that don't click, or what?
Yes, sutff like this actually matters to me. :P
Do any of them make a clicking sound when you press the buttons? [None of ours do; they all operate silently.]
Did you ever own a remote that clicked? [I never did.]
Remotes in comics and cartoons always click. And I know in some places, people actually refer to remotes as "clickers". So where the eff did this come from?
You see someone in a comic pointing a small non-descript object in their hand that goes "click" and you know it's a remote -- even though that object, in the very act of clicking, is acting unlike a remote.
Granted, there are lots of weird carryovers in our attitudes toward sounds. We still say that phones "ring" even though it's been years since they actually rang -- cuz they used to. Dogs never actually said "bow wow", but they do make some kinda sound, that's probably closer to "bow wow" than it is to, say, "ring ring".
But this whole idea of remotes clicking -- or even making any kind of sound at all -- we all seem to accept the idea, but why? Where did the idea come from? Is it only Canadian remotes that don't click, or what?
Yes, sutff like this actually matters to me. :P
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Date: 2006-02-13 03:43 am (UTC)Now, if I were a cartoonist drawing a person in a room changing the channel, I wouldn't have this option, because there's no one else in the room for him to tell that he's going to change the channel. So I would instead probably draw something like the word click above the remote in the picture to alert the audience that this has happened.
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Date: 2006-02-13 03:44 am (UTC)They were called "clickers" because they actually did click. I think an early version of the remote control sent a beam of light. You pointed it at one of the corners of the screen to make the TV do what you wanted it to do - change the channel or volume (yeah, make the TV bigger or smaller :).
Sometimes when I'm searching for the right word (which is happening a lot more often than I'd like to admit), I'll call it the "thing" or the "clicker". Sometimes I'll make the international sign language for "remote control" by holding my hand at arm's length in front of me, fingers flat below my thumb, and moving my thumb up and down.
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