On vacation, TV gets back seat

Last year, I wrote about how my three kids did not watch linear television during my family’s summer vacation to Northern California. Instead, their media usage was relegated to iPhones and DVDs.

Having returned from a vacation week on the Delaware shore this year, it appears that television made a comeback … sort of. My 10-year-old daughter discovered Disney’s “Hannah Montana” series during the week and watched several episodes via Mediacom’s on-demand service.

Other than an inning or two of the Orioles, who played games on the West Coast after the kids’ bedtime, nobody watched live linear television. They opted again for iPhones over TV and valued the house’s Wi-Fi service over multichannel video.

I know it’s a focus group of just one family. But based on the week at the beach, it still seems clear that TV networks and cable systems have to change the way they deliver video to account for the viewing habits that kids are developing.