Open letter to the TV industry

I think I understand your business model. You buy programming from some schmo and hope to earn money by selling advertising during its run on the air. But once the first airing of any program is over, I think you're settling. You're wasting its future earning potential.

In general, once we watch any first run episode of a television program, the chances of us ever seeing that episode again (legally) grow slim. Sure, we might catch a re-run during summer, or a writer's strike, or holiday, but that's it. If we're lucky, the program might go into syndication, but that doesn't mean our local station bought it, nor does it mean they'll even air it at a time that's convenient, or at all. Or worse - they may not effectively advertise that they've got it scheduled to air.

Then there's the DVD option. I'm not so sure I understand why television programming merits such a high dollar value on DVD - and don't you dare start freaking lecturing me about the potential for piracy.... just because a person walks into a local 7-11 and robs the place doesn't mean every person who walks into a store is a criminal. The same is true for consumers of television programming. We should not have to suffer any kind of hassle because some folks are stealing the material. But I mean - seriously..... $80+ per season of Sopranos? No wonder folks are stealing it. Didn't you guys make enough money during first run advertising?

So for those of us who missed the first run of any show, our options are limited. We can hope that the episode will air again, but we rarely have any idea when that will be. We can wait for a DVD release, which will often cost more than what the average consumer can afford. That's assuming there even is a DVD release. Many years ago I watched a delightful British program on a cable network in Canada that was called Smack The Pony - think Monty Python but with all women as the headliners. I got to see some episodes, then it was gone. Forever. Waited many years. No DVD. Wrote the original network that aired it in the UK. Clueless. But they finally (after 3 emails) volunteered the information that BBC Canada owns the rights to the program in Canada. So I wrote BBC Canada too. No answer. Nothing. So what are my options? Here you have someone who would actually pay whatever insane price you'd charge for a DVD set of the entire series of Smack The Pony.... except that it isn't available.

Now, we've had the technology for TV-on-demand for years. With digitization, storage concerns are now essentially moot. But the only on-demand choices we have are for a dozen or so movies that are already available by other means. Meanwhile, countless years worth of programming sit on a shelf somewhere, not earning the TV industry any money at all.......

Don't even get me started on movies and music...........