Don’t Touch That Dial! After 40 Years, Americans Hooked On Remote Controls

Charles O’Meara has 23 remote controls in his home - more if you count the spares stashed in a drawer.

“Without remote control, my life would be a living hell,” said O’Meara, president of Absolute Sound, a stereo and video store in Winter Park, Fla. “Just the thought of having to get up and down would be a nightmare.”

O’Meara is living proof of how far wireless remote control has come since its birth 40 years ago today.

There are an estimated 388 million to 400 million remotes in use today - four for every household in America - according to the Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Association.

That number is just an estimate, though, because remotes have become so ubiquitous, the association stopped counting.

Originally developed by Zenith Electronics Corp. to turn on and off television sets, remotes now control everything from car alarms to lights to drapes.

Why have remotes become like another appendage?

“I think we’re all lazy, and none of us wants to get off our couch,” said Linda Matter, office manager for a Winter Park family counselor.

“It’s convenient,” said O’Meara.

Ida Cook, professor of sociology at the University of Central Florida, said remotes feed Americans’ appetite for high-tech toys and pander to our obsession with efficiency.

“We probably, as a people, have become less tolerant of any lull or down time,” Cook said. “We want to be entertained in each moment.”

Bob Ziller, a psychology professor at the University of Florida, says it’s a question of control.

“It is sort of a magic wand,” Ziller said. “You can deceive yourself into believing you are not just a couch potato and you are actually involved, pretend you are sort of a director.”

But the issue of control can turn ugly.

Many women complain that their husbands refuse to turn loose of the remote, leaving them stranded on the beach while their mates surf the channels.

It all began innocently enough with Zenith’s “Space Commander.” The small, four-button box seems quaint by today’s standards, having more in common with a squirrel on a treadmill than the infrared technology used into today’s remotes.

You pushed a button, and a small mallet hit an aluminum rod inside, creating a high-pitched sound that caused the TV to change channels.

How much has the technology changed?

Recoton Corp., a Lake Mary electronics manufacturer, later this month plans to introduce a new line of remotes, capable of sending signals through walls and as far as 150 feet, using a combination of radio waves and infrared technology.