Speaking of HDTV

I use azureus, a popular BitTorrent client, for my BT transfers and getting my HDTV broadcast stuff. It has an RSSFeed plugin that just rocks. I've got pretty much all my favorite shows: Lost, Alias, Desperate Housewives (for the, um, wife), Veronica Mars (don't knock it till you watch it!), CSI (original), all the Law and Orders, etc. The only tough part is CSI and LAO, since there's so many spinoffs. I don't like the CSI spinoffs, and I like to keep my TV organized, so have all the different Law and Order shows going into their own subdirectories.
This came about because I was talking with Matt (Sam's boyfriend - Sam's an English girl who volunteers with me at God's Love We Deliver, Matt's her boyfriend, both very cool people and they're going to Carnival next year with us). Matt said he wanted the "set it and forget it" kind of deal. Well, this isn't perfect but it's pretty close. Now I just need a frontend that can use the remote control and tell me what I haven't watched yet, and I'm set - it's like a Tivo without needing cable.

On another note, since I put up those posts, Apple (or is it ABC) started offerring $1.99 versions of their two most popular TV shows - for the video iPod. Not exactly what I had in mind but it's a start. Now all we need is high-quality HDTV rips for $1.99 and we're in business. In fact, you know what? A decent interim solution would be to just make a "legal" version of the show with only nationwide (or global) advertisements (i.e. McDonalds, Coke, H&R Block, etc), and throw it into the BT universe. I think that a lot of people, if given the choice between a "legal" and "illegal" download (I use quotes because there's no precedent, but let's face it - it's probably illegal to download - or at least to upload, which (with BitTorrent) is a part of the downloading process), would probably choose the legal option. I know I would.
But, of course, that's not going to happen. Or, if it does, it'll be some really crappy, half-assed version; a medium-quality version with lots of ads thrown in, that you have to download from some ad-ridden site and pay $5 per episode. Something that nobody will go for, and then the TV company can say "well, we tried that, but the consumers just don't want to work with us - they just want to pirate our material and get it for free".
OK, I sense my own bitterness approaching. Signing off now.

--Nate

--Nate