Finally got rid of cable TV today (actually Mihaela did, it was her initiative). Renting movies on Netflix is quite enough, even more so if you consider that you can do video streaming from Netflix directly to the PS3. What with their tens of thousands of titles, I'll never run out of movies to watch. Kids get their cartoons too from the same source. Plenty of fish in that pond.

To stay informed, the Internet is quite enough - and actually better (aggregators like Google News, social news sites like Reddit, then there's Twitter etc.). News in the written form (even if it's digital) allow you and actually require you to think. News in the video form just make you dumb.

I'm not even considering the many hours wasted in the past on irrelevant things in front of the TV - time is beyond value, once it's gone you can't get it back no matter how much you're willing to pay for it. At least, with the movie rentals, I choose exactly how and when I spend my time with the TV.

There are also the video games - maybe a modern vice, but excellent to blow off steam, if need be. Again, I get full control over how and when I spend that time.

So, it's like this: the news trickle in throughout the day, from the Internet, whenever I take a break. I can't help it, really, given that I'm sitting in front of a computer all the time. When I'm away from the desk, well, there's the iPhone. :) And all these are news in the smart form, and I have enough time to absorb and digest them properly.

In the evening, I'm done with that. Not having to watch the stupid cable news, there's enough time to read a book or play with the kids or help them with homework. Amazing, isn't it? :) There's time to watch a movie, or maybe play a video game. As for cable news, as far as I'm concerned, they may go wherever it is that things go when they're sad and idiotic and expired and irrelevant.

Well, okay, maybe I watch Jon Stewart once in a while. But that's not news, right? ;-) And the show is on the Internet anyway - no need for cable TV. Having a small computer hooked up to the HD screen, next to the game console, helps too - it's Internet video streaming, but looks like "real" TV.

Maybe I'll put up an antenna after a while, just for the rare occasion when I want to record a show that's not on the Internet, but it's not going to the TV directly - it'll be hooked up with the DVR. Live TV was great 20 years ago or more - now it's hopelessly outdated, a mis-information channel, glitzy and brightly colored, but at best empty and usually worse.