The L.A Times has an article today pointing out that TV execs are having a devil of a time convincing people that when they download a television show from, say, BitTorrent, that they are stealing that show. In a weird way, it’s a problem that the TV industry created itself: for over a half-century, we’ve been told that, unlike a song, or a film, or a book, or a videogame — that show you are watching is free.
You the consumer aren’t paying for it, but rather the advertiser(s) who sponsoring that show, hoping to get you to purchase their product(s). My guess is that this is a model that is rapidly becoming outdated, and we are lurching toward a totally new era, where how we consume TV will be more like how we consume other media products.