So I gather that the new official policy over at the Sci Fi Channel is that the online streams of Battlestar Galactica now are delayed for a full week.
Which means that those of us without cable television have the choice either to remain a week behind on a show which has one of the largest online followings and for which it is nearly impossible to avoid spoilers even when one deliberately tries to avoid them (on the one hand), or turn to illegal means of keeping current (on the other hand).
I have always been perfectly willing to avail myself of legally-sanctioned means of watching television online. But the reality is that culture is not merely property.
The experience of culture is a collectively shared thing, and any company which disdains the cultural aspect of its property — especially when we’re talking about a show such as this one, whose value in no small part results from that collective and shared cultural experience of it — to the point of alienating half of its prospective audience for no rational reason?
That company doesn’t deserve my legally-sanctioned loyalty. I’ll watch their show in some form which doesn’t include the advertisements they sell during commercial breaks or in ad banners. I was willing to subject myself to those necessary obstacles, but not if it means having to wait a week, and thereby be denied my participation in the cultural experience of the show — from which it derives its value in the first place.
Does hulu.com get the episodes up sooner?