Don't box me in

TV "Space management is another significant factor. The box set has brought to broadcasting a library mentality that previously applied only to books and music. This is partly because of the rise of high-quality drama with enough ambiguity to bear repeated viewing, but it has been physically possible because the switch from VHS to DVD is, in dimensional terms, a move from sumo wrestler to supermodel: it is now possible to have a shelf or wall of favourite television, where, in the video age, a room would have been required." -- Mark Lawson on the tv dvd boxset phenomina.

Oh absolutely. Seven season of Buffy on dvd only use up the same amount of space as two of the old vhs boxes. I don't watch series on tv anymore because it is so much easier to add things to my Lovefilm queue and just wait for them to arrive -- and often these are series which simply don't appear on terrestrial television anyway. The L Word, Boston Legal, even Alias. Lost has gone too. Lawson does mention the price of owning a whole series, but even most boxsets present excellent value. I remember when I was fan of a certain series with Klingons, spending up to thirteen pounds for two episodes on tape. Now you can buy a whole season (in a sale) for just under twice that amount in a format that actually looks better than broadcast. That is extraordinary.