Nobody “stays tuned” anymore, except to UI metaphors that linger long past peak meaningfulness.
Tuning a radio or TV has evolved to finding and saving frequency presets during setup that we then occasionally click through when we’re not streaming on-demand non-live media feeds.
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Back in the day, “staying tuned” was actually two operations: finding and locking on to a frequency, and then staying on that channel. It was a form of waiting for updates. Today’s equivalent would be “hitting refresh”.
“Never miss an update” is the hoped for connection.
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Back in the days, changing channels, or surfing required some effort (including the “finding the remote” step), “staying tuned” required none.
That’s been reversed. The passive mode is surfing now. “Staying tuned” requires effort. You have to track continuity like a hunter.
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right but i mean we still have a 3.5" diskette icon that means 'save' so i feel there might be a bit of a queue for UI metaphor modernization
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Well, but that operation still has the same basic meaning. The problem with staying tuned is that it’s now a different non-default behavior and the default has shifted.
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Subscribe establishes a channel. It doesn't guarantee tuned active attention.
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You know what group is still tuned/tunes/tuning? Psychonauts.
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With older analog radios, you literally had to keep tuning the knobs, as you drove or as the weather shifted, or you'd get off the frequency.





