I WANT MY MTV!!!!!!!!!

When I was knee-high to a jack-a-lope, I remember watching TV and seeing Sting from The Police admonishing all of the kiddies out there in TV land to..."tell your local cable provider, 'I want my MTV'". Cable TV was a service for which you paid extra dinero. You'd shell out the extra dough because it was special. YA DID NOT HAVE TO WATCH COMMERCIALS!!! MTV was a new, hip thing that wasn't carried nationally. It became a huge success because people who shelled out cold, hard cash wanted a say in the programming. But, then we all got on with our lives and stopped paying attention to the product that we paid for, and like ninja farts, commercials began to sneak their way in.

Try to plug in the rabbit ears and watch major network television. Sonofabitch. Can't do it. TV used to be free...if you were willing to watch commercials. That was the trade off. If you had the cash; you could pay for the privlege of not having to watch the commercial pitch. The advertisements snuck right under the never-vigilant radar and the precedent was set.

The internet took notice, even though the consumer didn't. We pay to have internet service. Theoretically, we pay to not have to endure advertisements. Too late Kemosabe, You get 'em. Intially, I dug Hulu.com. I was happy to watch a feature length movie with three or four commercial breaks with a single thirty-second spot played in each intermission. Last week, I counted eleven breaks and instead of one commercial each, there were two. Slipped it right in, they did. Sneaky little ninja farts. The quality of available movies on Hulu.com has turned to complete shite as well. I don't know how many poorly srubbed skidmarks that Lifetime and Hallmark have puked out, but they all have a home on Hulu.com.

And, tonight...not a few minutes ago, I received the following message from the internet radio service, Pandora.com: "You have reached the monthly free listening limit". I was not aware that my "free listening experience" had a capacity. I was happy to trade a few moments of my time listening to advertisements for a quality aural experience. But, I didn't play the game. I didn't buy, buy, buy. And now, I feel like a heel. I have been heaping praise on Pandora.com. I have been telling everyone who would listen that Pandora.com offers a quality product; just as I did for Hulu.com, just as I did for MTV.

The problem isn't that I can't get cable TV and internet for free (I know, boo, hoo, hoo). The issue here is run-away consumerism. You used to pay more to get more. Now, you pay more to pay more. So, you have to work more, probably making or selling something to someone so that you can buy even more that you'll pay more for, so you have to work more...

I wonder what will happen when everyone does the selling and there is no one left who can afford to buy. I imagine we'll shell out $250 a month for the Premiere Platinum HD Commercial Cable Package. All ads, all the time. The Sham-Wow guy will host the Hot 100, counting down the best commercials of the week. Scrolling banners on all four edges of the screen will compete for ad space and you'll be able to upgrade for the split screen so that you can watch eight different ad channels at once. But, it won't matter because all of the stations will be owned by Sony/Disney/Viacom/Starbucks/Universal/Nike (a subsidiary of Wal-Mart). I can only pray that maybe...maybe...PBS will be buried in there somewhere. What? The government just cut funding to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to make room in the budget for another AIG bailout? Aww, nuts.