Competing with the pirates

In October 2005, Apple added downloadable television shows to its popular iTunes Store. The move jump-started the market for full-length TV shows online, and by January 2008, the store had sold more than 125 million episodes. In the meantime, though, a curious thing happened: Instead of seeing how much money they could collect from $1.99 downloads, the major networks made more of their shows available online for free.

By Jon Healey

April 15, 2008