I haven’t owned a TV in 4 years. I originally made the decision to ditch the TV in order to save money on the monthly cable bill and to become more productive. However, I did still have the itch occasionally to watch some specific TV shows that hadn’t yet made it to DVD and also to just watch some mindless TV once in awhile. So, thanks to the internet I didn’t have to look far. There are several ways to watch free online TV, and I’ve experimented with almost all of them. The one I most recommend is
online satellite TV . It does have an upfront cost that’s about as much as I use to pay for one month of cable. This program gets me satellite channels via free online TV, you just install and with an internet connection you’re watching satellite TV right on your computer.
For those not wanting to spend any money for true free online TV, fear not! There are other options, but none as convenient. The first would be sites like YouTube and Veoh. These are video sharing sites where users can upload videos that anyone can watch. The downside to this is that it is a copyright infringement, which makes it illegal. Although you will likely never get in trouble for it, this does limit the number of TV shows available via this route. Copyright holders are constantly having these sites remove their content, so it is not very reliable.
The next option would be to go to the websites of the shows or channels you want to watch, most will have free video available to users. The advantage to this is that your favorite shows are usually uploaded the day after they air and it’s completely legal. The downside is that not all shows are available and the ones that are have extensive advertising and the players are not the best and can be prone to glitches. They have gotten better, but I don’t understand why they get so angry at YouTube for having their content when users would go to the show’s site if the player was half as good as YouTube. The player glitches mainly come because these official sites are trying to get in as much advertising as possible that can’t be skipped by users.
There is also the option to download your shows from the internet via sharing sites, however this is very illegal and recently a wave of college students got sued for this common practice. You can also purchase downloads of episodes from iTunes for around $2.00 a piece.
The TV industry is changing and some people are speculating that in the future most people will watch TV online or for free on their TV sets via a high def antenna (a great option for free TV). I believe that one day all TV channels will upload their shows onto their own sites with sponsored advertising. Right now the industry is in an awkward transition phase where some companies are trying the free online viewing route with sponsored ads, some are trying the iTunes route, some a combination of both, and others are still trying in vain to keep their content off of the internet. I think that they will eventually have to take the attitude of, “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” and realize it’s easier to cater to what the public wants, than it is to try and force people to change their expectations. Bottom line is, people expect free online TV, and if they can’t find the show they want for free they’ll just move on to something else. For now, I’m happy with my legal
satellite free online TV, just a one-time fee of about what you would pay for one month of satellite service, and then it’s free. It’s worth it to not have to hassle with the minuscule selection of shows online and having to worry about illegally downloading. In my opinion, this is as free as free online TV can be.
