We've fallen out of love with television

It's that time of year again, when TV executives head for Tuscany, leaving the rest of us to watch shows such as Drivers From Hell, The House That Jack Built and Celebrities Under the Knife - programmes so tired and mouldy you imagine the departing channel bosses found them lying at the back of the fridge before dashing to the airport.

The summer provides us with the dog days of television. In previous eras, it spawned such dispiriting entertainments as Seaside Special and It's a Knockout. These days it's Big Brother and Gardeners' World Special and all the home-making advice you can bear.

But when the TV boss classes reconvene at the Edinburgh International Television Festival later this month, they'll have to face up to the fact that this year's poor ratings look like more than a summer blip. ITV has recorded not just low audience figures, but its lowest ever. Given the channel's dismal roster of shows, that is perhaps not surprising.

Over at BBC1 there was, at least, an attempt to buck the trend of summertime neglect. With much trumpeting, the network launched two new big-name drama series: Being April, starring Pauline Quirke, and Paradise Heights, starring Neil Morrissey and Ralf Little. Both flopped.

It's all part of an overall trend: in recent years, ratings for all programmes of whatever ilk have gone steadily downwards. The reason is not simply that many programmes are dumber than ever, more repetitive than ever and more missable than ever (though, God knows, they are). It is us, the British viewing public, who have changed. We have ended our affair with the box.

For years, Britain indulged in a passionate romance with television. We loved its immediacy, the way it arrived in our living-room like an old friend every night. We adored its cosy comedy, showing us people just like ourselves, only funnier. We loved its homely quiz shows, with people just like us, but cleverer. And its soap operas, which showed us people just like us - except they never stayed at home watching television.

The romance is over. What we once welcomed as a lovable and entertaining companion seems, in our eyes, to be a cheap seducer and a time-waster. For the past two decades the debate about the impact of television was predicated on the notion that it was addictive and held people in its thrall, stopping them experiencing the world directly.

It turns out that this was just a phase we were passing through. It may seem like a strange argument coming from me, of all people. A TV editor saying that people no longer love TV sounds rather like a turkey putting an X in the box marked Christmas. But all of us have to get used to social changes, and this is one we are living with right now. We may not love the box the way we used to, but it is still there, waiting to be watched.

When TV watching was in its heyday, people's lives were very different. At the end of the working day, families would gather for a communal meal and an evening of shared family fun watching Telly Addicts with Noel Edmonds.

TV was a national pastime. The morning talk with workmates was all about last night's telly and what was coming up that night. These days, if you bounced up to the drinks dispenser and said how excited you were to be going home to watch TV, you would be seen as a sad case.

Few families now watch the TV together - the "TV dinner" has a nostalgic ring to it these days. Today's family does not squeeze onto a sofa like the Royle family; chances are they are all in different rooms of the house, doing different things. TV viewing is no longer shared and dissected. There are fewer and fewer happily passive Royles for the programme-makers to fall back on.

The beginning of the end came with the arrival of the video recorder. This revolutionary machine not only allows viewers to watch even more programmes than they already do, but, vitally, it frees people from "TV guilt".

When a serious documentary or landmark drama appears in the schedules - something that people feel they should be watching - they can appease their conscience by saying, "I didn't see it, but I have it on tapeî. With the appeasement of "TV guilt", it's only a short step to not recording those "important" programmes, and then to not even looking at the TV schedules to see what's on.

After all, if you're not going to watch it, why bother? With satellite channels galore, most programmes are repeated, revived and reinvented many times over.

A big American drama like The West Wing is given several outings, on different channels, to grab as many viewers as possible. The thriller 24, for example, has been shown weekly on BBC2, with a repeat and the following episode on BBC Choice, plus regular "catch-up" collections of episodes on BBC2. It's no longer a case of making an "appointment to view" (as they say in TV circles) - with so many options, it's a major challenge trying to miss an episode.

Added to that, there are now recording machines (Tivo and Sky Plus) which " learn" what programmes you like and store them unprompted. TVon-demand is not far away . All of which means that television is no longer a conveyor belt, on which we have to catch the goodies before they disappear. It is an ever-open chocolate box, and we can take our pick whenever we like. It has become a "take it or leave it" medium.

It's no surprise that more and more people are deciding to leave it. Programmes have become increasingly formulaic and dumbed down. With so many channels, and so much airtime to fill, cheap and uninventive routes are followed.

BBC1 bosses may have expected Paradise Heights and Being April to be summer hits, but, having watched them because they pay me to, how could anyone in their heart of hearts think that these half-hearted offerings deserved success?

These were formula dramas, the like of which we have seen a dozen times before or more and, alas, will be offered many times again. The roguish antics of Paradise Heights? A tired reworking of Minder. The single-mum shenanigans of Being April? Shades of Making Out, Playing the Field, Linda Green etc, etc.

Elsewhere, TV has become a remorseless diet of crime reconstructions, docusoaps (mostly centred on airports, bizarrely) and celebrity-orientated nonsense.

It's not all TV's fault, I concede. Like someone who has got over a teenage crush, the nation has moved on from its passion for television. We have grown up and got a life: or failing that, a multi-port connection to the internet.