I lack a television. A few years ago, I’m sure, this would be ridiculous for someone like me, so in love with entertainment to force myself to go without a television. There are a few simple reasons why I didn’t, which follow.

1. The Television licence is like £130, and I’m not the type to try and get away with it
2. Most of what’s on TV is crap that I don’t watch
3. I can’t schedule myself for anything, I missed most everything I like when I was at home.
4. Most of the TV I do like is on Sky, which I can’t get in student accommodation, and is a stupid luxury I really can’t afford.
5. I have a laptop, and I get a lot of entertainment from it.

Read on to read what crap I watch…

The last reason is of course the most fundamental of these, because after all, a laptop with the internet is the biggest worry a television has these days. I already bought my laptop (a 2006 MacBook Pro) and the internet is only £90 a year, high for those who have their free ubiquitous wi-fi on campus, but I don’t, it sucks, but it beats the TV licence. So what do I do? Torrent? No, my university has the open mindedness to close every port that isn’t used for the world wide web, that includes e-mail, I will continue to complain about this as much as I can, as I believe it is important to leave e-mail available. What’s the point of my snazzy new Mail program otherwise? Listen to radio? Nope, not really, nothing’s ever on during the day or evenings that I like or know I would like. Er… what then? The Internet! Yes, with torrenting damned to the depths of useful feature hell, I have a great 10 mbps connection to play with, which means Podcasts and forward thinking American media conglomerates.

I also, much to my frustration, can’t watch BBC iPlayer or 4oD. Mac. I’ll have to boot camp/parallels again.

First, the latter, thedailyshow.com has been a huge god send to me, with its lengthy archive going right back to 1999, I literally have years of ad-supported entertainment to dig my teeth into when I’m bored. Secondly Podcasts, you may or may not know what these things are, but they started out as mp3 radio style shows on various topics which caught on due to the ubiquity of MP3 players such as the market leading Apple iPod (hence the name). Of course nowadays there are literally thousands of podcasts, video and audio and the industry that is building up is realising that they might be a bit bigger than just playing on iPods. Whatever podcasts become, and I’m sure they’re destined for bigger things, I already watch quite a few, and listen to a few others. The ones that first attracted me were Diggnation and TWIT, both of these are tech focused, but one is far more entertaining than the other. Diggnation is a video show where 2 guys just sit on a couch and talk about the top stories on Digg.com for that week. This is entertaining and one of the things I look forward to seeing in the week. TWIT on the otherhand and MacBreak Weekly are really just a time to geek out, though not uber technical it us fun to listen to their arguments and predictions for the future. Yellow Submarine iPod anyone?

However recently I’ve started to explore more podcasts, as they become more and more common. The company co-founded by ex-TechTV host and Digg founder Kevin Rose, Revision3 which gained fame as the producers of the simple Diggnation show, have gained funding, which means they could produce more professional looking shows. my personal favourite new show has been Tekzilla, which is the most entertaining and professional show I have seen from them. I also enjoy The Totally Rad Show and Systm, though mostly for the interactions of the hosts than the subject as I don’t normally look into the things they cover.

Lastly I’ve discovered TV on DVD, House is amazing! Though what do you do when you’re finished with the box set? Sorry if this post is long and rambling, I don’t know what I’m talking about really.

Tags: blog //