Our life is simple: we watch only The Daily Show and Colbert Report (and, when it's in season, Battlestar Galactica). And occasional "local on the 8s" on the Weather Channel. My husband sometimes channel-surfs for documentaries after the kids are in bed, but that's about it. I think I've checked the tv listings in the newspaper twice in the last year.

Turn off your tv during the day, Kevin! You're not missing anything.

Don't you have the TV Guide channel, or your cable system's equivalent?

desmoinesdem is right! But why are you paying the cable company? I watch BSG via iTunes. Best of PBS on the web. And, well, that's it. Movies on DVD from the local video store that gives 20% back to our PTA.

All that? Just for some TV? Here -- I'll save you the bother.

Daytime listings, Monday-Sunday: crap.

Nighttime listings, Monday-Sunday: more crap, unless you have HBO.

Daytime/nighttime listings, Monday-Sunday, HBO: mostly crap.

We recently dropped our cable completely, getting an old-fashioned antenna to pick up the local channels. Why? Well, I looked at my cable bill, and after the latest increases we were paying close to $1000 per year, despite having no premium channels. It was insane. Further, if we ever decided to get an HDTV, we'd have to pay an additional charge to get the HD signals. (With an antenna, you get those no additional charge.)

So what do you miss out on? Aside from the movies (which you can easily rent), there's the various cable series like Sopranos and Battlestar Galactica, if you are into them, which are available on DVD or, if you're impatient, through iTunes, for a fraction of what you pay to get them from cable. Also you miss Fox News/CNN/MSGOP etc. No great loss, IMHO, but you can pick up the more interesting clips from Crooks & Liars if you want.

Anyway, once you have no cable the channel listings questions becomes much simplified. Yahoo has a perfectly adequate set of local listings. Really, you'll find you don't miss all the rest of that cable dreck. Most of the time you could surf through all the upper cable channels and not find anything worth watching anyway.

Don't watch so much TV. Seriously, TV listings are nice in the fall when you want to know which NFL games are on in your market, and since I live in Wisconsin I have to check somewhere to find out when TBS is showing a Braves game. But this information you can find in the sports section.

My TV time approaches zero, but I think Kevin has a fair complaint. In this information age, how hard could it be for someone to have a complete, current TV directory?

I see a niche there, whether web-based (probably easier), or on the tube. That's easy eyeballs and ears- let the viewer navigate to the info they need, while subjecting them to revenue-generating ads. My Firefox Remove It Permanently extension would let me remove the crud from view anyway.

"What other options are there?"

Shouldn't we be the ones getting paid for this? :)

If you use Yahoo! as your web portal (and even if you don't) you can set up a free account to customize it and download daily listings for the channels you access. It's clumsy but at least it's available and it's free. You can get local movie theater schedules and show times, too.
A better course, as others here have suggested, is to just stop watching tv. Why anyone would want to watch anything on daytime television is beyond me. And except for Stewart, Colbert and Seinfeld reruns what's there to watch at night?

My point might have gotten buried, but primetime listings aren't the problem. And I don't watch all that much primetime TV anyway.

But what about weekends? Movies? Sports? Specials? I actually have more time to watch TV on the weekend than on weekdays, but that's the time it's the hardest to figure out what's playing.

Get a mac. That'll fix it.

Kevin, it's the weekend, in Southern California. The sun is shining. Go out and play.

Or get the listings from tvguide.com or meevee.com, if you must.

Since we got the TiVo, I don't even know when shows are on anymore.

I can look up stuff online, which would be great if I had a computer sitting next my couch. But I don't.

Awwww, how quaint.

I thought that every blogger watched TV either in their home office while sitting in front of their desktop or in their living room with their laptop on their... lap.

Kevin, why do you make it so difficult. You have a computer, you have a printer. Just get the listings, if you really are that desperate, and print them out for the day, the week, or what have you. No need to buy the paper--there is nothing in the paper anyway, just like there is nothing on TV.

There are a couple of dozen websites that will create a customized TV listing for your town and for your cable/sat/local. tv.yahoo.com is one. But there are plenty of others, like TVGuide. Just look for it and don't bug your readers.

Two points:

1) I still can't get over the fact that TV Guide no longer carries full TV listings, and is instead reinvented as a poor-man's Entertainment Weekly. Um, what? That's like ESPN not carrying sports, or a Star Wars movie without spaceships or robots or Jedi, or a Die Hard sequel with no explosions or terrorists or Bruce Willis. What's the point?

2) The disappearance of TV listings from newspapers is another mystifying example of the way that newspapers seem bound and determined to run themselves out of business. I'm sympathetic to the difficulties of covering 24 hours of programming on 300+ channels every day, but still, when people are abandoning your product in droves, it doesn't make sense to cut out one of the few comparative advantages you have over other media.

I guess the answer is: if you're enough of a TV addict to want the full listings for the day/week, you probably already have TiVo or digital cable, and those have built-in online systems to manage your TV consumption.

I'm also struck by the number of people I know who are abandoning TV completely, or just keep cable around for sports. Their big-screens are used primarily for viewing DVDs and playing console games. Any show worth following comes out in DVD form (or iTunes, or BitTorrent bootleg), and it's often more satisfying to watch that way. There's obviously still a market for watching TV programs, as the ratings for American Idol demonstrate, but I wonder if broadcast/cable TV is about to lose its 50-year crown as the center of most Americans' home lives.

Kevin,

Except for the Wall Street Journal, I haven't bought a paper newspaper in years and yet its easy enough find out what shows are on.

http://www.tvguide.com/Listings/
click on "edit location" and with your zip code and cable provider, it will even tell you which number each channel is on your cable box (you can check the listings for up to two weeks in advance).

Bonus hint, google your zipcode and "showtimes" and it will give you the movie listings for your area. So the Times can drop that next and you'll still be OK.

You know, I noticed something interesting about my favorite TV shows: they're on at the same time on the same day every week. Sometimes they temporarily reschedule a show at a different time, but they usually announce it at the end of the program, a week in advance.

TV Guide doesn't have any daytime listings on the weekend? That's completely insane. That would be just the time when I would need them. So how am I supposed to figure out what's playing on the weekends? Go on the computer????? Sheesh.

Kevin-

I live in Fullerton and subscribe to the Register, primarily to get the TV section. Go ahead and suck it up and subscribe for Sunday only, but do NOT read the Commentary section. My God, it'll make your eyes bleed!!! :)

Dave

What other options are there? I can look up stuff online, which would be great if I had a computer sitting next my couch. But I don't.

You are kidding, right?

I'm with Disputo, Kevin. Get a laptop with WiFi. Then you have something to do during the commercials as well.

Of course, if you're thinking about having any more kids, don't keep it on your lap for too long. :)

You can go to the LA Times website and get a .pdf of the schedule, which would be in the TV Times, if they still published it, and print it out yourself.

http://www.calendarlive.com/tv/

People should learn to help themselves.

Wireless laptop computer, meet Kevin Drums couch.

Kevin, it pissed me off, too. Seriously.

Fortunately my local paper - the Pasadena Star News - carries complete listings for both daytime and primetime, PLUS the chart that matches stations with channel numbers for each cable company. The Times dropped that a while back.

I've subscribed to the LA Times for 30 years, and it's been a great paper - until lately. The Tribune Company has been a disaster, and this new owner doesn't look too promising, either. Damn it.

Shoot your television. Problem solved.

I can look up stuff online, which would be great if I had a computer sitting next my couch.

The listings don't change that much between the time you look them up online and the time that you walk into the tv room.

Here in the backwaters of Old Europe, we have free digital television, which we receive via a box into which the set is plugged (newer sets have the digital receiver built in — and, of course, virtually all sets are widescreen).

I push a button, and the on-screen programme schedule is displayed, complete with synopses and running time. And I can check what's on tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, as time creeps in its petty pace from day to day until the last syllable of recorded time.

Of course, the only thing worth watching, usually, is an Inspector Morse repeat, but that's beside the point.

Sounds like a business opportunity to me. Expland your vast publishing empire!

Dude,

Don't mean to be rude, but, you must be getting old.

TV Guide for tv listings? I can't remember the last time I needed a tv guide. If you aren't using the built-in guide for the tv, you look it up on the internet. If you don't have a connection near the tv - number 1 - get a laptop, get internet through the house - but number 2, print out the listings, if you simply must see it on paper.

getting tv listings, for someone whose JOB is to post on the internet, shouldn't be a big deal.

When the LA Times made the announcement about the TV guide magazine thing, they offered subscribers the possibility of contninuing to get the guide in the Saturday paper, or not. I chose 'not', because I never used it. One of my neighbors in the apartment building chose to continue getting it. So I have to be careful which copy of the Saturday paper I grab, so as to not take her's with the TV guide.

So if you're an all-week subscriber, call'em up and you'll be able to get it again (unless they changed it a second time - I haven't been first one to the Saturday papers in a while :-)

Ditch the cable, buy an HDTV and antenna with what you save, and view the on-screen guide on the digital channels. You can always watch Comedy Central online, without the ads!

The last time I used a newspaper for TV or movie listings was sometime in the early 90s. Plus, we all know you only watch 24 & Lost - so why would you need a guide?

I like couchville.com for local listings.

Why are you watching so much television this is even a concern? Between work, sleep, exercise. hobbies, keeping up a home and cars, attending to pets,volunteer work, travel and dozens of other demands on my time I'm lucky to find 30 minutes a day to view any TV at all. You seem like a busy, involved, professional person. Why all the TV?

We recently dropped our cable completely, getting an old-fashioned antenna to pick up the local channels. Why?

We never had cable until about 5-6 years ago, The 3 networks and PBS were fine. Then we decided to get high-speed internet, and found our best option was Comcast.

Or, you could just not watch TV. It won't kill you, you know.

Well, Kevin, some of have lives and don't spend all our time sitting in front of the TV in our housecoat like the Great Lebowski. Turn off the TV and experience life.

What Chauncey said, save for the HBO crap.

Tv's not worth the time it takes to watch it; it'll rot your mind and make you fat from inactivity.

And Comcast WAS the best internet option, till recently when the prices changed (it was some bizarre frob on their cheap-phone deal; yes, the phone is cheap, but the internet got way expensive.)

I *am* cheap. It's your pron that got expensive.

Duh, use the internet man. Even the staid New York Times carries all the TV listings online.

Geezer alert!!

Al on May 7, 2007 at 7:22 AM:

..the Great Lebowski.

Jeez, Al...The one occasion where you get it halfway right and you still manage to screw it up...It's "The Big Lebowski", Al.

*snickers*

Tivo, baby! It keeps track of when my favorite shows are on and whether it's a rerun, and only records the ones I want. If I want to watch live TV, the onscreen guide tells me what's on now and what's coming up. And since I've got it hooked up to the network, I can also check the listings and schedule a recording from any computer.

Oh, and I can also download shows to my laptop or ipod, so I can watch them wherever I want. All for less than the cost of digital cable.

If you only watch a few channels regularly (e.g., Turner Classic Movies, the History Channel), the upcoming schedule can be e-mailed to you through their Web sites.

I use zap2it.com and titantv.com to overcome this

Gotta go with the TiVo crowd. Minimal investment, always have a surfable guide onscreen for seeing what's on now, preprogramming your channel changes, and recording stuff you might not be awake for.

We actually have TiVo's clunky cousin, Windows Media Center. So the computer is the TV, which saves some living room space.

Since going the DVR route, we watch more TV, but spend a lot less time doing it. Which is really shocking at first. In a good way. Imagine watching a whole season of 24 where you can fast-forward the commercials, the "last week on..." and the "next week on..." Probably take 16 hours tops.

Dish Network, FTW!

It will be a cold day in hell before I go back to cable.....

Another vote here for TiVo. Kevin, you need TiVo for lots of other reasons, but the listings are a little side advantage.

Kevin

Another vote for the DVR. We watch TV when we have the time, not when the networks put them on. Always a convenience; a real since the baby arrived.

Would it be more cost-effective to get some sort of a cable/high-speed Internet deal (I know Comcast has offers from time to time)? That's what we have.

More to the point, couldn't you, given your line of work, write off both the high-speed Internet and cable (CNN, C-Span, RealTime with Bill Maher, etc.) as a business expense?

Well, Kevin, some of have lives and don't spend all our time sitting in front of the TV in our housecoat like the Great Lebowski. Turn off the TV and experience life.

Posted by: Al on May 7, 2007 at 7:22 AM | PERMALINK

Hmmm...a neocon who LIVES on a liberal website claims he has a "life". Very funny Al.

Should be embedded in the TV itself as part of programming. There should be a guide mode where you click a button and a window pops up somewhere on the screen (not completely covering what you're watching) that allows you to scroll through channels and then listings).

Geez, listen to all the TV snobs on here. But the snobs have a point. I cover television for a newspaper in a medium-sized city. And we too recently cut back our daily television listings and switched our weekly guide to a less convenient format that many readers hate.

The reason we're pissing off our loyal readers is that advertisers loathe the TV section. The people who use it are older (I'll leap to no conclusions about Kevin). The majority of viewers use DVR's and on-screen guides (Nielsen recently began tracking DVR viewership and, for a show like "Lost," time-delayed viewing can add 20 percent to the ratings).

It costs a lot of money to provide that resource for a shrinking number of readers and newspapers have to weigh the benefits. It's the same reason many papers are ditching their daily stock listings: Most people get the information somewhere else.

In a few more years, I'm pretty sure video on demand and IPTV are going to be taking big chunks out of television viewership, sort of re-creating the effect cable had on broadcast in the '70s and '80s. So then, even on-screen guides will be obsolete.

Not that it matters all that much, but the New York Times was some months ahead in stopping the thoroughgoing TV guide that came with the Sunday paper. The daily guides in the Times do not include daytime programs and, as an added disservice, the Sunday programs are published in an obscure section of the Saturday paper.

solution? go for random access. If you insist on keeping a cable connection (not a given), then figure out the three or four channels you really, really bother watching (ours are PBS--local, natch--TCM, Food Network [caloriporn], Comedy Central for the Daily Show/Colbert and, less often, SciFi and CNN. Assume that whatever you do, you'll end up on one of these for most of the evening, if you have time to turn the set on. Look up what they have scheduled for the month, print it out and don't sweat the rest. it's only television, after all.

As Milton Garrison testifies, the NY Times did the same thing months back. I find it incredibly annoying. I like to check for overnight movies to tape (esp. on TCM, IFC, Sundance or BBC America), and the daily Times doesn't consider that part of the schedule important enough to list. I've taken to buying the Daily News because they still offer a guide, but they don't list all channels (the Sundance channel apparently doesn't interest their readers).

I just find the whole thing irritating, and all this "Get Tivo" (i.e., spend more money) or "Print it from the web" advice irks me even more. The schedule's been there all my life, free, and now they've taken it away. Don't tell I shouldn't be pissed off about that.

It's a little sad that I would comment on this post, being normally a lurker, isn't it? But you were not getting much love here, Kevin, and I feel your pain. This is the 21st century for goodness' sake, and I'd like to know what is on television! This is not difficult! I may look into some of the on-line suggestions made above. We don't have cable, but we have an HDTV, and it comes with a great TV guide feature built in. Only problem is you can't see anything that was on earlier than now (for instance to see if you missed something). And it takes forever to tab very far into the future. HDTV is wunderbar in general--you need one. Trust me.

Frankly, I'm shocked to learn that there is anyone left in the U.S. under the age of 90 who still relies on the newspaper to find out what is on TV. Seriously.

One word - Tivo

I'll make my annual post to the best blog in town.

I replaced the newspaper tv guide with AOL TV and MSN TV sites a long time ago.

Spend a few bucks on a wireless router and a laptop, and get your tv listings on the couch, while you also surf the web. The wireless laptop travels with you when you need it to, and the cost of the router is recovered quickly from savings on unneeded newspaper subscriptions and purchases.

While you peruse the tv listings you are also looking up information about shows and actors and writers on IMDB and getting a lot of good background information. You will get episode guides for every tv show ever syndicated. Online tv info leaves print in the dust.

Installation is easy and once it's set up, it's almost maintenance free. Once you have it you will wonder why you didn't do it sooner.

It's 2007. Nobody uses newspaper tv listings any more.

echoing others -- get TiVo! works with basic cable, and has digital-cable-like on-screen guide

I haven't looked at a TV Guide in the 3 years i've had the tivo

Robert Earle: the Saturday guide is gone.

To all of you advocating using the embedded listings: I don't know how yours work, but ours runs in a continuous loop, and it shows what's on now and for the next couple of hours. Suppose you want to know what's on tomorrow night? Or suppose you want to know what channel something's on RIGHT NOW? You have to wait for the stupid loop to come back around. I hate that embedded thing.

To all of you advocating TiVo: Fine service, but if that's the only way to get your tv listings, then corporations really do rule the world. Geez. Some of us geezers still know how to read, you know?

Great call by "ssmug" because I've been looking for a simple, fast loading TV listing site ever since Yahoo screwed up their listings.
While MeeVee is okay, it's still more slower than the old Yahoo listings.

But couchville.com seems to be just right: fast and simple, yet details on each program available with just one click.

The only downside is that couchville.com requires a cookie to remember your local settings. The old Yahoo didn't need a cookie (it used a different URL for each locale).

that "more" (in more lower)is my goof leftover from 'loads more slowly'.

but if that's the only way to get your tv listings, then corporations really do rule the world.

Bingo!

Our satellite service has a decnt on-screen guide but I miss the magazine they used to send out. Now I can buy it at Borders if I want to but, as Kevin would say, sheesh. If want to know what's on next week, or when this or that PBS show will be repeated, I'm out of luck. Someone remarked above that if this is the information society, why's some information hard to get hold of? Related to my favorite question: if this is a service economy why am I pumping my own damn gas?

Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition (and Vista Ultimate, though I wouldn't recommend it) have an excellent TV guide with listings for all local and national channels going out fourteen days. For a one-time cost for the upgrade and the addition of a dual-tuner card (like nVidia's excellent DualTV MCE) you can enjoy tivo-like funtionality without an additional monthly fee.

Add a Microsoft remote for convenience (although I use a gyrotools remote mouse as well) and (a) large capacity hard disk drive(s) and you can programs and record hundreds of hours of tv programming from the womb-like embrace of your favorite armchair or couch if you choose. The dual channel tuner gives the ability to watch one show and record another or record two shows while watching a recorded show or movie at the same time.

I rarely watch live tv anymore, choosing instead to record so I can zap past the commercials.

(YMMV, so just can the TYPICAL anti-microsoft, pro-tivo fanboy comments, please.)

Um, mhr, you realize that Chirac (the current President) and Sarcozy are members of the same party, right? "In a dramatic break with the past, the French have elected a politician from the incumbent party of 12 years."

I would add in a good word or ten for the Office, Veronica Mars, Friday Night Lights, etc.

We're really in the new golden age of television programming. Just avoid 90% of the crap and you're good to go.

But it is better to watch via DV-R or DVD.

The wireless network and the laptop on the couch solution is worth it just for the ability to search IMDB when you're straining your brain trying to figure out where you've seen that actor before. Or Wikipedia when the listing just tells you the name of a show and you have no idea of the basic premise, or which season a particular episode fits in.

Even on-screen guides have limitations.

You will have to use the internet.

Oh jesus christ.

Mention TV and watch the "*I* don't watch any TV" big dick competitors come out of the woodwork.

Bully for all of you. It's great that you save your precious time for, uh, posting anonymous comments on a blog.

One more Tivo vote. It makes a paper guide completely unnecessary. The on screen guide is simple and convenient if you are looking for live or future programs. But timeshifting anything other than sports or hyper-timely news events is where it's at.

Sorry Kev, the only TV I watch now are DVD boxed sets. Or clips of stuff on YouTube. I prefer having control over what I watch and when I watch it.

I don't have cable TV. Everything on mainstream TV seems like total crap and the ads make it even worse. I used to watch Lost, but gave up on that around midseason. If I were to turn on broadcast TV now it would be to watch foreign language programming which at least has some element of novelty to it.

These days I get a recommendation about a show, watch it on YouTube or elsewhere, and if I like it, I buy it on DVD. A recent example is The Venture Brothers, which for any comic book/sci fi geeks is SO worth taking a look at. But I'm not going to shell out for cable TV just for it, so I'll wait for the third season to filter out on YouTube and then buy the DVD set.

Hey, Kevin, ignore the TV snobs; they remind me of an episode of the old Dick Van Dyke show where one of a group of the "intellectual elite," upon learning that Rob Petrie was a TV writer, proclaimed, "I don't OWN a television MACHINE." Hmph!

TiVo has changed my life. My husband got it for my birthday last year; this year, he upgraded to HD-TiVo for me (we each have our own TV for the sake of marital harmony). I have no idea when most shows are on; I set up my season passes to record shows that I like or want to check out, and then I view them at my convenience. Stewart is always at the top of the list, but there are a few good network shows, too ("Heroes," "My Name Is Earl," "60 Minutes") and loads of interesting PBS and cable stuff. Note to any TV snobs who are still reading: I also work full time, walk in the sunshine, hike in redwood forests, read voraciously, cook gourmet meals, garden, travel, and enjoy living my life! So there! ;^)

Laptop. WiFi. http://www.zap2it.com. Some assembly required.

I'm totally with Kevin here. I still rely on the Washington Post's weekly TV guide even though A) I don't watch all that much TV, and B) I've almost always got a wifi-enabled laptop with me.

It's not about watching too much TV -- if you watch TV all the time, you either don't care or already know what's on. It's only when you watch TV occasionally that you actually need the guide (especially for things that aren't shown at a regular fixed time, like sporting events, Frontline specials, etc...).

We have cheap (i.e. non-digital) cable, and our company has moved even the humble TV guide channel to digital-only in a typically vicious and consumer-unfriendly effort to make the cheap options less convenient and user friendly, so there's no "embedded" guide to use.

And the internet options (zap2it or whatever) are incredibly cumbersome, slow to load, and usually require multiple screens and pull-down menus to find what you're actually looking for.

A weekly, paper guide that you're familiar with in terms of format/layout is about 1000 times more convenient than looking things up on a website.

I used to use tvguide.com but their ads are extremely annoying. Couchville.com is nice, though they should provide more info on a specific show via a rollover or a single click, rather than clicking twice for the full program info. Minor complaint though.

yet another TiVo or cable-company provided DVR. It will get you what you want *and* free up your time so that you only watch what you want to watch. Good stuff.

Get a Tivo. Great listings, best user interface since the Macintosh, and best of all, you will watch what you want WHEN you want it.

Hubby and I find we watch a lot less TV with Tivo and enjoy it a lot more.

Go to the New York Times television page:

http://www.nytimes.com/pages/arts/television/index.html

There is link there to a TV listings application that allows you to enter your ZIP code, you provider, and gives you your complete listings.

I live in Michigan, and it is the only way I can find a complete set of listings other than to watch the scroll on channel 99.

Use the TV Guide online, with wi-fi and a laptop. How can you call yourself tech-savvy without a laptop open at all times? Geez...

Send a complaint. The Chicago Sun-Times tried this a couple months back. The reader response was so overwhelming that it took only a few weeks before they returned the tv section to the Sunday paper.

demtom: I just find the whole thing irritating, and all this "Get Tivo" (i.e., spend more money) or "Print it from the web" advice irks me even more. The schedule's been there all my life, free, and now they've taken it away. Don't tell I shouldn't be pissed off about that.

The schedule isn't the reason to get TiVo. That's just a little side advantage. The reason to get TiVo is to take control of your viewing, to watch Stewart and Colbert when it is convenient for you, not when it is convenient for the network to broadcast it.

The New York Times dropped its' excellent TV guide over a year ago. I presume it was just too expensive to continue printing and employees were complaining about their 401ks and stockholders were whining too. The Times seems to have more ads than stories these days, but still seems to be on the edge of financial disaster. I actually think that all of the television networks, cable and otherwise, should subsidize the newspaper guides, as I think they lose viewers who just don't know where to find their programing. My satellite and cable providers have lengthy channel lists that they are always shaking up, and if a program is too hard to find I'm not going to work too hard to locate it.

Kurt, at least several people I know (including me) did call the Times, to no avail.

Anandine, I already do watch TV at my convenience: I tape stuff and watch it later (always zapping through commercials). But to know when things are on, I need a SECHEDULE -- especially if it's something (like an old movie) I didn't know in advance to look for.

Everybody seems so cavalier about adding expenses like Tivo to a household. I already spend enough, thank you.

Try This: http://sourceforge.net/projects/freeguide-tv/

Tivo

The Dish Network has an onscreen guide with a search function that will search about three weeks ahead, and a built-in dvr.

this comment is a good example of the BS that fills way too many blogs. vent to your wife or friends about the inane trivialities of life but please spare your readers. thanks!

I sympathize with Kevin, but I'm not sure he can stop the "march of progress".

There's a bunch of sites that provide TV listings, which you can customize to your local zip code, and select whether you have cable service or just broadcast reception. Here's a great on-line comparison of ten of them:
http://www.downloadsquad.com/2007/04/04/10-online-tv-guides-compared/
It looks to me like MeeVee provides printing out capabilities, if you don't or can't have a laptop with wifi next to your TV.

I travel on business a lot, and find that these on-line guides work great for letting me navigate through the local cable channels and for finding stuff that's on that I might want to watch. Most of these guides let you search on names or subjects, which can be sure fire way to find content that you're interested in.

For all those anti-TV snobs out there, I'd like to point out that there is good and informative stuff on TV. You just have to find it. If you haven't found it, it doesn't mean that TV is bad, just that you haven't really looked for it.

A good guide can help you find it. What channels have Manchester United's soccer match, or that 80's interview with John Cleese, or the male pulchritude of Tom Selleck on display in an old Magnum rerun? With a good guide you can find exactly the content you want. TiVo (or a ReplayTV, or Windows Media Player, or somesuch) is like having a TV guide on speed. It gets you to the best content all the time every time, and puts it in front of you when YOU want it and have time for it. With my ReplayTV, I was able to discover MORE of the Michael Caine/Harry Palmer movies (who knew that he made so many?), a broadcast of the restored version of "Metropolis" -- a movie I probably would never have purchased on DVD, some excellent British comedies on BBC America, and informative arts programs on Ovation (they ran a great series on the ransacked historical art in Iraq). There's great stuff out there in the vast TV wasteland, but only if you can find it.

I, too, hesitated about adding another monthly bill, but I've had my DVR for over two years, and I can unequivocally say it has improved my entire life. It has finally made television truly entertaining and informative, AND reduced the overall hours I spend with it on.

And ladies, Magnum reruns are on WGN and SleuthTV.

You know the newspapers are now eliminating the "book review" sections. The SF Chronicle tried that a couple of years ago, and the public howled. They brought it back (6 pages) for a year or so, and now they've reduced it to 4 pages with a lot of ads. It will probably disappear again very soon.

As for weekend TV viewing, CSPAN Book TV is one of the best things going. Check it out.

So You Want a Good T.V. Guide
(cognitorex blogspot com)
The purpose of television is to present advertising to consumers.
Actors, anchors, studio execs and athletes become mega wealthy from the multi trillion dollar advertising tidal wave.
Docile and benumbed to the corporate theft inherent in that glowing tube of advertisments in their living rooms, the American citizenry coughs up $500 to a $1,000 a year per family to be thus solicited.
We pay to be subjected to 24/7 advertisments in our homes. Go figure.
If the viewing public, of the demographic size and wealth of L.A., simply said 'we all refuse to pay a penny for cable service', then presto capitalistic miracle, service would reappear funded by the advertisers who want your eyeballs on those screens.
Think about it. You or we might even say "And while we've got your ear, give us a decent flippin program guide!!"

http://tv.yahoo.com/

Works for me.

What the hell kind of TV guide do you have anyhow? Have they changed it since I quit my subscription about 6 years ago? It was quite a thick little book each week...

Let's see here...

1) Kevin still subscribes to the LAT.

2) Kevin is actually considering subscribing to the OC Register.

3) Kevin needs to use a printed TV guide. In 2007.

4) Kevin lives in Southern California, and has gotten all pissy because he wants to stay indoors all weekend and watch other people on TV playing outdoors and engaging other people and, generally, having a great time of life.

So...what the heck are we doing coming here and reading the thoughts of this guy?

KEVIN - FYI, TV Guide stopped having *local* TV listings when they went to the magazine sized, national format. So they list off what the networks have in prime time, and they have some write ups. But for the daytime, when shows differ, or if you want to know what *YOUR* PBS station is showing, you're SOL.

It's a piece of crap. Fortunately, our subscription *finally* ran out - the thing was clutter on our coffee table.