not have to think about anything, and watching a movie in the comfort of your home, curled up on the couch with your family is just the thing, especially after a long day. Wouldn't it be nice if you could find a movie that the WHOLE family could watch. A movie that you don't have to worry about fast forwarding scenes, or pushing the mute button (always a few seconds AFTER the swear word has been said). How nice would it be to pick a movie, pick out what you want to see in that said movie, and watch without a care in the world? It sounds too good to be true, doesn't it?
Enter Vid-angel! A service that can do all that and Much more...their catch phrase "Watch whatever the bleep you want" is catchy, and makes you want to try it out.. Read on to get my opinion on this popular filtering service.
I was so excited to try this out. not only was this app going to let us watch the movies we liked, but it was also going to open up a whole new world of movies and TV shows that we had previously stayed away from. We are a pretty conservative family when it comes to what we watch/listen too, so you can see why this would be great for our family. For those who don't know what Vid-Angel is, let me explain. Vid-angel is an app with a paid subscription, that allows you to sync with your paid streaming subscriptions such as Prime Video, Netflix. You can download the app to your phones, smart TV's, laptops, and tablets. You can then pick out what show you want, and set the filters. It allows you to filter out any and everything you can think of. For instance you can filter out kissing, sex, nudity, swear words, graphic content, and the list goes on and on. SERIOUSLY...the filter list is amazingly long...they even have sub filters! I was really impressed with the filtering system. You can pick and choose to get rid of everything, or you can use the sub filter to break it down even more. If you put a filter on for swearing, they will edit the word and there will be a silent moment where the swear word was. if you have edited kissing/sex/nudity, they cut the scenes out completely. It will just seem like a small blip in the show.
After searching and reading up on Vid-Angel, I obviously had to have it. and even better, they were offering a free month. Ummm yes please, where do I sign up! All I could think about was how many shows we could watch as a family now. I made a list...yes I know it sounds crazy, but I haveseen so many previews of shows that looked like it had a great story line, but because of the rating would never watch it.
I signed up and eagerly set up the app on all the tablets, phones, and laptops in our home. In hindsight I was a little over eager and should have tried it on one tablet first.
Here is where it gets interesting...at least for me.
I don't have a lot of time to actually watch shows, which I seemed to temporarily forget when I was making the list of MUST see shows. We lead a pretty busy life between work, homeschooling, and running our business...throw in church, ice skating, and other obligations, and I am lucky if I get to sit down and watch a full episode of a show on Netflix...let alone find time to watch the long list that I just made.
I kept rationalizing that it was still going to be great...even if we we were only able to watch a few shows a week it would still be worth it. We would't have to worry about questionable scenes, swear words, or anything else we decided to filter out. It was going to be great!
Or so I thought!
I picked out a show...set my filters...and was about to start watching it when I looked at what I would be watching and hearing. Vid angel has this neat little comparison bar that lets you see a line of what scenes and words you have filtered out with the new running time compared to what you would have heard and seen if you had just watched it unfiltered.
What a neat idea....they want you to see what they are editing out for you.
The only thing was...by the time I put all the filters I wanted, there wasn't much left of the show. It cut out over half of the show.
Which made me stop and think...Why would I want to watch/support something that needed to be so heavily edited. It was at this point in time, that my husband and I talked about how/if we would use this service, if it was worth the money every month to watch something that we would have to filter so heavily. We both came to the conclusion that this was NOT something that our family had to have. While it is awesome that this is an options out there for Christians, and I applaud the fact that they have made this available. We just don't feel like it is something worth putting our money, and more importantly our TIME into. This does not mean if they add new shows that can be filtered (like more then only one season of NCIS) that we wouldn't try it again at some point. It just means at this time in our life, it is not a need for us.
This is my PERSONAL opinion, and I know quiet a few people who Use and LOVE this app. This is not meant to dissuade anyone from trying this filtering service (if you are wanting to try it, they have 30 days free trial going on now, check it out and see if it is something you and your family can utilize), it has some great points, and I can see where the appeal is.
At this point in our life our family is striving to "cultivate the lovely" in our home which means, less electronics/TV and more reading as a family, more game nights, more hanging out with friends and families, and most importantly learning how to see Gods work in our everyday life. Asking each other questions such as...
"How have you been kind today?"
"What was the high point/low point of your day?"
"Did you read anything interesting today?"
and most importantly...."Where did you see Jesus today? "
These are the types of things we want to hear about, and cultivate in our family.
Not..."what did you watch today?"
I LOVE this quote by Charlotte Mason, and it is one that I am taking to heart with my own child.
" An observant Child should be put in the way of things worth observing."
What a wonderful thought! What do we, as parents, want our children observing? Nature, the beauty that surrounds us everyday, great works of literature and music...these are the things I want my daughter to observe, and what we are striving to accomplish in our own home.
Comments
Post a Comment