"Here we are now, entertain us!"

One of the greatest things that I love about the Internet is that I can usually get access to media pretty fast. I want a movie? I can rent it on iTunes or Amazon, or sometimes watch it on instant view on Netflix. Or I can buy it from iTunes or Amazon. I can order DVDs to get in my mail box online, I can watch my favorite shows on Hulu, and older shows on Netflix. I can stream music from last.fm, Pandora and a million other places, as well as buy music from Amazon or iTunes.

But what happens when I can't find what I want? Specifically, let's consider the case of How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory.

I don't watch TV on a normal schedule. There are some weeks where I watch 0 hours. And then there are other weeks where I watch TONS. So things like Hulu and Netflix are great: I can watch what I want, when I want. Sometimes things will expire, but I get alerts and it's usually up online for a month or longer.

Now, HIMYM and BBT aren't on Hulu. They are only on CBS' website. And they only keep a single episode up for a week-ish. So when I don't have time to keep up, I'm screwed. I love both shows, but I've only seen the first two episodes of each this TV season because I have a pretty active life and don't have time to sit there and argue with CBS about being a stupid head (like they'd listen to me, anyways). So what am I to do?

Well, I can buy the season on iTunes. But I don't want to keep it. I just want to watch it once to keep current. Maybe I'll buy it on DVDs later, but I don't want to invest $60 right now on digital content. I can't rent the shows from iTunes, nor Amazon.

So let's get this straight. There isn't a free streaming service available. There isn't a renting service available. And the only way I can catch up is to pay $60 on iTunes.

Well, CBS, I am not spending 60 goddamned dollars on TV. I don't have cable because it's not necessary and I'm not going to pay through the nose for your content. I typically have a problem with people illegally downloading things, but when you make it nigh impossible for me to get reasonably priced access to content and materials, I really feel like I have very little choice in the matter. I can wait for it to come out on Netflix and get it in the mail, or I can torrent it with very few actual repercussions (statistically speaking).

Given that this is all part of a service that aims at delivering instant access to anything I want, they are failing me. I'm being told, on one hand, that I should expect to get just about anything I want with the click of a button. On the other hand, there are two rather popular shows that I can't get like that, and so I'm forced to make a decision: illegally download something or be patient with content even though I can get other, similar content in a legal manner. I'm faced with a decision that really isn't that hard.

I don't have a problem paying for content. What I do have a problem with is a system that sets me up with two choices that are both against the norm of other services offered and services advertised. When renting content becomes too difficult (and by difficult, I mean I'm LOOKING at iTunes, Hulu, Amazon and Netflix for solutions; I have accounts on each and regularly buy and watch other things from all of them), I'm going to say "Screw the system" and just download stuff.

[I won't do it on the Yale network. My current roommate works for InfoSec, I work for ITS and it would just look really bad for her to have to yell at her roommate for a  DMCA violation. I don't download as a guest on other people's networks, because if something bad happens, it's not their fault and I don't want to cause problems for them. It will happen at home, on my Mac Mini, through Transmission and a throttled download/upload rate so as not to hog the bandwidth.]

I'm not a terrible, unethical person for doing this. I'm someone who's frustrated by the system. I see a workaround, and though it's not my first choice, it will get the job done and I will get what I want in the end. I understand that some people might have issues with my choices, but as I've explained, I've looked for reasonable, legal means to get what I want. They don't exist. And I'm not the only person with this issue, either. Until CBS gets its head on straight, I'm going to download and watch content at my leisure.