American TV is so stupid!

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I don't watch most shows on television. I like to watch "Bones" and "Antiques Roadshow" on PBS. I like documentaries because they help fulfill my desire for information. I like some of the shows on BBC America. I really enjoyed "Keeping Up Appearances" and "As Time Goes By".

Wow, I had no idea how good I had it. My TV has an "OFF" button!

From the book, Free Ride by Robert Levine, where in the author analyzes how the internet is affecting decent TV shows, first he notes that cable makes TV shows that are so good, you will PAY to watch them. Examples such as Mad Men, Sons of Anarchy, Breaking Bad. They don't make their money on the commercials they make their money on the subscriptions.

The four major networks in USA have gone in a different direction, meaning reality TV. "As they lose young viewers to cable and ad dollars to the Internet, they fund fewer scripted shows. That's the real reason why reality shows have become so popular; they're cheap. "Without a doubt, there's a trend on broadcast networks ...and you see it in the number of reality shows that now populate prime time..to get as much audience as quickly and as inexpensively as you can, sell advertising, and move on to the next one, " Sapan says. This is the business model that brought us The Bachelor.

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Meanwhile, producers are flocking to making TV specifically to be viewed online, again cheaper production values, blah, blah, blah.

It will all get sorted eventually, but that is why there is so much boring, embarrassing, ridiculous Reality TV now.

Plan B, don't have a TV at all or just don't watch it. There is a whole decade of popular culture I don't know a thing about because I was boycotting TV, I thought it was stupid and something my parents did.....

5 Words - My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding.

Watch it, get your soul destroyed....s....l.....o....w....l....yyyyyyy.

What MV said, the off button...

You have to remember that TV's demographic is mainly people who haven't figured out that the Internet and video games are better sources of entertainment. If a TV show is really really good, then you might as well just wait a while and rent the DVD set, or watch it on an online subscription service. If a TV show isn't all that good, then why would you watch it in the first place?

American television is mostly garbage because most of the best programming these days come from subscription television, basic cable (prime-time), broadcast television (prime-time), sport, and movies. The rest is full of daytime television garbage for people who are out of work for various reasons, "local" news, and informericals, reality television garbage than real programming. Even the best programming these days, you have to buy cable,and even then the programming is limited to the most profitable narrow genres.

I get my visual content via the internet from various sources, because cable has switched over from niche programming, to reality tv with a theme. G4 got affected by it, Discovery channel got affected by it, A and E, MTV and everything else on cable.

As for PBS, everytime I switched to it they're broadcasting some stupid pledge break show for old people to donate just to produce more pledge break programming. PBS compared to the BBC is a joke.

Seriously, how do people watch them anyway? I do not get the appeal of these programs. Besides I've stopped watching cable because I've moved from a house to a apartment that is difficult to get cable from.

There are few good shows because it takes a lot of talent to make good television. There's a lot that goes into making TV shows and movies and we have higher standards than the majority, so we often get screwed. Easier to pander to the masses than aim for a more sophisticated crowd.

That said, I love the Late Late Show with Craig ferguson and we do have shows like Grimm, Leverage, Better Off Ted and Arrested Development...

Here are the american tv shows I usually watch:

-Daily Show
-Colbert Report
-Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman
-Jimmy Fallon

I use to watch Monk and Pysch, but I can't get the new episodes of Pysch, and Monk ended.

Another good show is Myth-busters.

Sometimes I watch Star Trek on Netflix, but that probably doesn't count.

Are these shows good or bad?

Daily Show and COlbert Report are awesome...I also like The Big Bang Theory, Spin City and Scrubs.

Lately I've been watching a lot of Classic TV, namely ME-TV, Retro-TV and occasionally, AntennaTV. About the only modern shows that I watch, other than the local news, is Dr. Phil, CSI, and Great Performances from the Metropolitan Opera. I watch the classic show like Bonanzo, the original Hawaii Five Oh, Gunsmoke, Dragnet, Adam-12 and Emergency! since they are the only shows that make sense to me. I also watch Hopalong Cassidy, since it went off the air before I was born, to see what was the big deal with Bill Boyd, who played Hoppy on radio, in the movies and TV. I watch the Cisco Kid, mostly because I was a fan of O. Henry at one time. Lassie, I have to turn off at times since I end up having a meltdown, because I end up missing the collie and Sheltie I had growing up, as well as the collie mom and dad had while I was in grad school. Too Cute on Animal Planet will set me off on the waterworks, depending on the breed.

ME-TV Saturday night. Batman, Lost in Space then Star Trek!