Saved by iTunes!

My television is useless. DirecTV cut me off because I was 30 days late paying my bill. But nearly at the same time, my Samsung DirecTiVo failed. And I tried replacing it with my Highes DirecTiVo and that produced the dreaded Green Screen I referred to in an earlier post. Meanwhile, I am not able to watch television, a really interesting test of my mental stability and general emotional health. I was getting pretty worried that I would begin to miss whole episodes of Lost. (I think I can manage if I miss CSI, Desperate Housewives and even Survivor, which isn't quite as interesting this season as it has been in the past. And I watched a few episodes of Rome and would like to watch the others, but never got time to watch THAT much television.) I would be a lesser man if I missed even one episode of Lost!

I've been reading, of course, how Apple strong-armed Disney ABC into selling episodes of Lost and Desperate Housewives on Apple's iTunes Music Store the day after they air, for playing on the latest iPod, which can handle video. I don't have that iPod. (I bought the 60GB Photo iPod not too long ago, but before the video iPod was announced or even rumored.) But it finally clicked that you don't need an iPod to buy the episodes and watch them, you just need iTunes and an account at the store. So, in desperation, I turned last night to iTunes and downloaded the one episode of Lost ("What Kate Did") that I did miss this past week. I had to give up the comfy chair and living room environment to watch it on my Macintosh. For $2, here's what I got. Very high resolution. Portable (on my Macintosh notebook). Commercial free without having to skip through the ads. And it's stored on my computer to watch again in the future if I want.

Congratulations to NBC for joining ABC in this experiment; if only they were selling shows I wanted to watch!

Comments

[Chris Hanson]

Actually, it's ABC, not CBS, from whence "Lost" came. And NBC isn't the only network that just joined iTunes, USA and the Sci-Fi Channel both have shows available now too. (The new "Battlestar Galactica" is actually really good...)

[Stewart Alsop]

Thanks for the correction! My mistake is a demonstration of how weak those television "brands" ABC, CBS and NBC are: I can never remember which three letters produced which show!

[Gilman Louie]

Ever since I bought a video iPod, all I watch now are Lost and Battlestar Galactica. I've turned over the Tivo to my two year old (Blues Clues). It's really interesting to have TV shows on the iPod. It allows me to watch whenever I have a 5 or 10 min break in my real life action. TIVO changed the way I watched television. The video iPod is changing the way I think about television. Consider: $1.99 a show vs a $70-$100 cable or sat monthly fee. You'll have to watch 35-50 shows a week to get your money back. I just don't watch that much TV. Also, $1.99 is a fantastic price point for 45 minutes of great entertainment. As far as value is concern, $1.99 per show (45 mins) beats $.99 per song (<5 mins) or $20 for a DVD (<2 hrs). What about news and local programming....well the internet has already won that war. I’m not worried about selection. Apple seems to be getting the shows I want to watch. I’m looking forward to all of the homebrewed Video podcasts.