THE ON DEMAND

Please stop telling me about the on demand television. Enough already.

Who's demanding television? What am I - Mussolini? Slapping my palm against the desk, "I must have television! Bring me television! Get me Dick York episodes of Bewitched immediately!!!"

Really, TV people, here's the deal I'm offering - broadcast stuff I want to see and I'll tune in, okay? Broadcast stuff I'm not so interested in, I'll just switch off. Let's not overcomplicate the equation here.

And the interactive TV - pressing a red button - is this really "interacting"? Because, you see, pressing a button on my remote to watch something else - I'm pretty sure we've already got this concept. In the old days, we used to call that "switching over". I'm on the interactive stuff, and, really, I'm still just watching. It's very passive. My interactivity was a whole lot higher when I plugged my TV set in in the first place, if we can be honest with each other.

When you offer me an interactive TV service, I don't expect to just press a button and watch some wardrobe person choosing shirts. I expect to be there, in the kitchen with Darrin and Samantha Stephens, doing the dishes while they're talking over breakfast.

"Good morning, darling."

"Good morning, honey. You'll be pleased to know I haven’t used magic once so far today."

"That's just great, dear. But why is there a clown doing the washing up?"

"Don't mind me, bub, I'm just interacting with the TV."

"Well, you're getting soap suds all over the front of the cabinet, there."

"Eurgh! Tough crowd!"

You know, I'm turning on the TV, I'm going through the channels, I've got twelve property selling shows, half a dozen news channels warning me that there may or may not be a hosepipe ban next month, and an old episode of Friends to contend with. I don't seem to be finding a lot of on demand here - mostly what I'm getting is a glut of supply.