Television's Decline?

Starting with the easier questions first, my favorite shows are House and a hilarious Britcom called The IT Crowd. (For links to the episodes, check here: <http://www.surfthechannel.com/show/277.html>.) With Glee looking promising as well, I suppose I'll throw that one in there too. Past those, though, I don't watch TV all that regularly, and besides when House begins airing tomorrow, I don't watch any shows on real-time television - they're either online or via season DVD releases.

I think television is what you make out of it. If you buy into the advertising ploys, then you're the victim of large-scale business conglomerates; if you make TV a habit, you're the victim of your own lack of restraint. It has a flipside, too: If you use it as a learning utility, it's extremely useful, and it can be great for just relaxing, if you don't take it too far.

It's true that nowadays TV isn't the head honcho when it comes to where kids invest their time. From the time they're able to sit upright at the keyboard until geriatric arthritis makes clicking the mouse too painful, people are turning more and more away from television and more and more towards computers. On the one hand, it's a step up in mental engagement. On the other hand...it's not really a very big step at all.