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Review Technology

Internet P2P Television

I learned that with BitTorrent and a lot of patience there is no TV show that I have to miss any longer.

A funny thing happened to me this week. Actually, something funny always seems to happen to me, it just isn’t usually ha-ha kind of funny. I discovered the wealth of TV shows archived and presented for my (and your) viewing enjoyment on the internet.

And it’s not just any old internet. This is the super secret world of back room P2P file sharing, growing up and making it more tolerable for the masses. Using a combination of BitTorrent technology with the P2P search engine of the moment, ISOHunt, and a suitable download client on Windows, called Azureus, I have found that you can download just about any episode of any popular (and some not-so-popular) television shows. Seeing as how I currently have more time than common sense, I have installed all of this P2P-ware on one of my PCs and tried it.

I started off with an easy one: CSI. I found that virtually every show this season is online. Next I went looking for something I haven’t seen: Desparate Housewives. Not only did I find all the episodes, but some nice folks have bundled up the first 6 shows into a single archive. Whats better still is that most of these programs are HDTV transfers, so on my 21″ monitor I’m watching full screen goodness, not the SD (standard definition) postage stamp size video with horrible artifacts.

All of this learning has taught me a few things:

  • TV distribution has to change to suit the consumer
  • Higher quality programming wins the day, no matter where your audience is located
  • PVRs that try to control what you watch and how you watch are doomed
  • It must suck to be a TV advertiser

All of this TV, all in HDTV, all without commercials. It is truly amazing and as the bandwidth to the home continues to go up I don’t see how the TV market will survive in its current form. Lets hope they wake up and make the right moves for the consumer before they get Napser-ized like the record companies did.