Goodbye TV, hello broadband

An interesting experiment in Wired magazine, as Robert Lemos gives up cable and tries watching TV solely through broadband. His conclusion? Within a few years we'll all be doing the same - although there are still some problems to iron out.

Microsoft's rental system is essentially the same as cable companies' video-on-demand options. You pay, download a movie, get two weeks to play it and, once you begin, you have to finish in 24 hours. Not the strongest model, in my mind. For my wife and I, finishing a movie in a day can be a struggle, so we had to wait for a night when all the kids had fallen asleep to take the plunge, gambling we could eke two hours of movie-time out of the next 24.