PROJECT / 01 FEATURE ARTICLE
InterDemTVInterdimensional Cable
A retro-futurist web television for random signal hunting and internet wandering.
01 Receiver sequence
From source feeds to channel surfing
- 01Sources
- 02Catalog
- 03Shuffle
- 04Tune
- 05Save / skip
02 Project overview
A receiver for internet discovery
InterDemTV turns a refreshed catalog of internet video into a constrained, television-like mode of discovery. Instead of search or a category browser, the interface asks a viewer to surf through a shuffled sequence of channels.
A retro CRT television, signal-room scene, and physical-style remote frame the experience. Viewers move forward or backward through the receiver sequence, then save a channel or permanently skip it in their own browser. Its core remains channel surfing and internet discovery.
03 Content pipeline
A generated channel catalog
The browser reads the generated catalog; it does not fetch Reddit at runtime. Video files remain hosted by YouTube.
04 Implementation
A static receiver with local state
The application is static HTML, CSS, and JavaScript on GitHub Pages. A daily workflow collects a curated source set through Reddit RSS and Arctic Shift, produces a catalog of unique YouTube IDs, and can check that IDs are public and embeddable before the catalog is published. An experimental phosphor broadcast interface and Three.js broadcast environment support the receiver, alongside Smart TV and browser compatibility work.
At load, the receiver Fisher–Yates shuffles the catalog, then traverses that sequence forward or backward while skipping locally blocked IDs and playback failures. The RND control has a separate role: for a newly loaded video longer than five minutes, it selects a random start point while leaving at least the final minute available.
Favorites, permanent skips, and receiver settings such as channel, volume, mute state, random mode, and ambience persist in localStorage. Playback positions are held only for the current page session. A service worker caches first-party static assets; YouTube playback remains outside that cache.
05 Viewer workflow
Tune, move, keep, or reject
- 01
Power on
Load the shuffled receiver sequence and tune the current saved channel when one exists.
- 02
Move through channels
Go forward or backward through the shuffled list; blocked and failed videos are left out of the sequence.
- 03
Change the signal
Use RND to enter longer videos at a different point, or FILTER to turn CRT display effects on or off.
- 04
Keep or reject
Save a favorite or permanently skip an unwanted channel. Both choices remain local to the browser.
06 Receiver controls
A small set of deliberate controls
Previous and next travel through one shuffled receiver sequence.
RND changes the start point inside longer videos; FILTER changes CRT display effects only.
Favorites and permanent skips are stored in the browser, without accounts or cloud sync.
Saved channel, volume, mute state, random mode, and ambience return across sessions.
Fullscreen, a help modal, and keyboard shortcuts support the receiver interface.
InterDemTV keeps control intentionally narrow: it is a channel-surfing experiment, without a queue, watched-history view, or content-filtering system.