Favorite tv shows

[Farseer]

These beings do not own a TV. Yet they watch TV shows.

Our family spent years in a similar scenario as you beings currently find yourselves in, and life was good.

Sometimes I find that I would like to return to that time...but Farseer's husband and the youngest Farseer heir may object (strongly) to Farseer tossing out the telly, or fiddling with the TV satellite dish.

I imagine that Game of Thrones will eventually make its way over here, to Oz. Chances are that I will not have the books all read by then though! Not sure how I'd go with catching it online as our internet connection is satellite only (same sa for our television reception), and will forever remain so if my understanding of the planned National Broadband Network is correct. I'll have to catch it when it reaches DVD status...which it no doubt will.

[fool-ish]

I don't watch an awful of tv, because most British tv is absolute rubbish! Soap operas, reality shows (total overload of those!) cops and medical dramas and most of them bloody terrible! Every now and again we get a decent series, not very often though. I very much resent paying the licence fee for what I consider to be a second rate service.

['thul]

It is very simple to avoid having to pay those fees. Do not have a TV in your ownership. It is actually fairly refreshing. Aside from half a TV some 4+ years ago, these beings have never owned a TV. Why watch TV where you have to fit your schedule to the TV channels' schedules, when you can skip it and fit the programs to your schedule? As an added bonus, one can thusly skip the 1 year plus wait for newer shows.

[Farseer]

I very much resent paying the licence fee for what I consider to be a second rate service.

In my ignorance, I must hereby use possibly the most memorable quote from any politician in Australia's history (the response given by Pauline Hanson when she was asked in an interview if she was xenophobic, as she had no idea what this meant ): "Please explain?"

What is this 'licence fee' that you refer to, fool-ish? Do you mean pay
TV (extra channels to those normally on offer) or do you have to pay for general, free-to-air TV viewing? We have free television here in Australia (lots of channels on offer now with the recent, nation-wide upgrade to digital television, though I can't receive that digital service out here yet so only have four free-to-air channels). There is, however, the option to also receive many other channels via various pay TV service providers eg FOXTEL or AUSTAR. Which I would never have as I just hate the thought of having to pay for television service, especially when our satellite drops out at even a hint of cloud cover!

I don't watch an awful of tv, because most British tv is absolute rubbish!

I grew up on a diet of British shows (I could only get one channel back then!) but don't watch much of anything any more.

['thul]

Some nations have a license fee for owning a TV. That fee goes (in Norway at least) towards funding an ad-free channel. The only way to own a TV and not be forced to pay that fee is to physically seal off one of the input ports on the TV. It does not matter if one never uses it, nor if one does not have the necessary boxes to give it any comprehensible signals, one still has to pay unless that input port is shut, be it with welding or some other, similarly permanent means.

[fool-ish]

We pay for a tv licence annually (I think it's currently around £140-ish) to fund the BBC, the ad-free channel. Admittedly, the BBC do provide the better programmes for the most part, but they're still not great and certainly not worth the fee. In addition to that, we have a 'freeview' box which provides limited cable/satellite channels, all very repetitive though.

[Nuytsia]

I don't watch an awful of tv, because most British tv is absolute rubbish! Soap operas, reality shows (total overload of those!) cops and medical dramas and most of them bloody terrible! Every now and again we get a decent series, not very often though. I very much resent paying the licence fee for what I consider to be a second rate service.

Yup sounds just like Australian TV!!! There's only a few shows worth watching on ..... but that's probably a good thing as too much TV rots your brain anyway

........ I just hate the thought of having to pay for television service, especially when our satellite drops out at even a hint of cloud cover!

And I thought having the picture break up during heavy rain was bad!
(as well as the internet dropping out and phone being unusable...)

['thul]

only 140ish?
That converts to roughly 1250 NOK, and the Norwegian TV license fee is on roughly 2580. Not sure if that is paid half every six months or if it is the full sum every 6 months. So the Norwegian license fee is either 2x or 4x the one you mentioned, Fool-ish. Is it not obvious why these beings see no reason to own a TV?

[fool-ish]

only 140ish?
That converts to roughly 1250 NOK, and the Norwegian TV license fee is on roughly 2580. Not sure if that is paid half every six months or if it is the full sum every 6 months. So the Norwegian license fee is either 2x or 4x the one you mentioned, Fool-ish. Is it not obvious why these beings see no reason to own a TV?

Good grief! I can see exactly why you don't own a TV, that is a scandalous amount of money! The thing is, our TV is on pretty much all the time. My daughter, in particular watches it a lot and then of course we have DVDs to watch. So there will probably never be a time when there is no telly in the house. It's part of our life I suppose, in a way.

[Albertosaurus Rex]

Finally! After a three week hiatus, the newest episode of My Little Pony: Friendship of Magic will be airing today.

Apparently the brony (older male fans of FiM) subculture has grown so much recently that the media is starting to pay attention and a documentary maker is currently going around looking for bronies to interview on tv. Sounds good, right? Except that the program in question happens to be My Strange Addiction, featuring people with really bizarre fetishes and obsessions, like the woman who sleeps with her blow drier and people who eat stuff like toilet paper and glass. (Seriously, check out their website.) In other words, they're probably not going to interview a well-balanced person who just happens to like the cartoon, like 99% of all bronies, but some complete weirdo.

Only about eight episodes to go of Stargate Universe. I'll be sorry to see it end. While the quality can be a little uneven, it's one of the more unique sf shows I've seen lately. No other show has quite managed to convey the vastness of space like SGU.