TV on the Internet
For a while I’ve been planning to write about how my house recently decided to save $80 a month and cancel cable. Growing up, I definitely watched a lot of television. When I went to college, I also watched a lot of television. During the first half of grad school, when I lived by myself, I still watched a lot of television (plus I watched it using a projector, so the number of square inches of video consumed per day was at an all time high). Last year, though, when I moved in with several friends, I watched slightly less television, though still more than anyone else in the house. I guess after a while, TV starts to wear on you.
When I agreed to cancel cable, it was only partially an attempt to watch less TV. As a bona fide P2P researcher, and general internet enthusiast, I had a sense that this was the year for internet television. After all, there’s iTunes, BitTorrent, more and more networks putting their shows online, and countless apps and websites trying out new ways of putting TV stations online. At the moment, most of these options are much less convenient than cable, but many are cheaper, and I remain optimistic. Also in the near future I hope to have a better computer hooked up to our TV.
I’ll probably write more soon about which of the above options work best. For now, I’m simply announcing that the future of internet-based television is well underway. Plus with the writer’s strike upon us, maybe we’ll soon be able to enjoy shows written specifically for the internet (maybe I can even higher some professional writers to help out with this blog). For now, we can just pass the time by watching both television networks and DVD manufactures fail to provide consumers with a steady flow of newly produced high-quality entertainment.
November 12th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
i think your “ode to television” poem would have been an appropriate addition to this post as it eloquently portrays just how significant a role television has played in your life…