The Future of TV?

Yesterday I added this Roku app which simply plays loops of young women dancing.  Sometimes they are in swimsuits, sometimes in their underwear, other times low cut dresses.  Sometimes they are on the beach, sometimes indoors in what look like beach side houses, other times they are outdoors at inland locations. (Apparently, these locations are all in California).  They all dance provocatively, but never actually show anything, so the app avoids being classified as 'adult'.  It is strangely fascinating to watch - TV as moving wallpaper personified.  Perhaps, I idly thought while half-watching it today, when I had it on as 'background noise', this is the ultimate future of television - minimalist content requiring minimalist viewer engagement.  Why spend money producing elaborate dramas when you can just entrance viewers with an endless parade of anonymous girls gyrating around?  Because, the thing is, that as you watch it, you find yourself starting to speculate about what you are watching: who are these girls?  What, exactly, are they doing?  What's their backstory?  Where do they go, what do they do, when they aren't half naked in front of the cameras?  After a while, you start making up your own narratives about them, how they might relate to each other, (sometimes two appear together in a video).

I'm convinced that this basic idea could be expanded by enterprising streaming services to create a viable replacement for a plethora of more expensive content.  Just present random footage of people just doing normal stuff - no explanations of who or where they are, what they do, etc.  Instead, just let viewers make up their own narratives based on what they see and what they hear in snatches of dialogue.  As with those dancing Californian girls, you'll soo find yourself making up your own stories about how they relate to each other and what is going on - it's a psychological imperative in humans to impose narrative structures on what we see, (in its most extreme form, this results in those whacked out conspiracy theories), to create a sense of order in the observed world.  Just imagine the buzz this could generate as people discussed it online, set up blogs, Facebook and What's App groups to try and interpret what they are seeing.  You'd doubtless get competing narratives battling it out on social media.  Viewers could maybe take bets on what they think is going on - or maybe the streamers could run competitions with cash prizes for those viewers who can correctly predict what's going to happen next.  It would be reality TV, must-see drama and gameshow all in one.  Best of all, from the streaming companies' perspective, it would be cheap to produce: just random footage of real people.  No actors, writers, bloated film crews, directors, contestants, etc, to pay.  Believe me, it's the future of TV!