Well, not *completely* free, but word comes from the LA Times that Fox is following the footsteps of other major US TV networks in a move to make their primetime shows more accessible — and more important, freely *available* — via a variety of online schemes.

Fox is planning to use iTunes, to showcase the premiere episodes of its fall season shows, including Prison Break [did anyone else find the season premiere kind of meh?], K-Ville, and a few others. ABC is partnering with AOL to push full episodes (not just premiere’s) of its prime time dramas, like Desperate Housewives and Grey’s Anatomy, while NBC made some waves (and possibly in the early stages of scuttling Hulu in the process) about doing the same with its own shows, such as Heroes (yeah!) through its own “NBC Direct” programming.

Now, yes — this is definitely a win for viewers. Yes, yes, we can roll out the tired clarion call of “we want to watch what we want to, where we want to and when we want to”. Plus, its all free.

But the studios are getting a *real* benefit out of this as well, and its a direct function of what many critics are calling a new Golden Era of television — which, over the past few years, has been triggered by many things. Not the least of which has been the de-stigmatization of TV as a medium for ‘proper’ actors and actresses, and the development of many very good shows on prime time television, not just stuff you might see on cable.

But I think the problem that studios are having is that while many television shows are *good*, many of them also follow extended story arcs, some of which only develop over an entire *season* (or, multiple seasons, or, never — *LOST*, cough cough).

This is very good for the writers, as they get a chance to flex their storytelling muscles.

This is very *bad* for the studios, because it forces viewers to pick and choose where they want to emotionally invest their time in, allowing some dramas that would otherwise be *good*, languish, and pretty quickly evaporate.

So why are free television shows good for network studios?

It allows fans (or would-be fans) in their own time and at their own pace catch up with shows they haven’t seen — or, more importantly, *try* new shows.

For many television shows, its impossible to start watching in the *middle* of a season, or sometimes, even difficult after you’ve missed the first few episodes. You might then rationalize to yourself that you’ll just catch it when it goes on DVD. [A great example is the show "24", where the whole season is one entire story (one day, actually), where it is virtually impossible to start watching without understanding what happened in the show prior.]

Well, for first run series, they may never get that chance if the viewership is low, and second of all, studios lose out on lucrative sponsorships if people *aren’t* watching this season for a *chance* at “buying” the DVD.

Now it actually remains to be seen if all of this free giving away *does* make a difference. I suspect it will, but ultimately it hinges on the supposition that there will be some people who are happy to watch these multi-million dollar productions on a tiny screen.

But there are *more* who would be happier watching it on their television.

And if the studios are right, and these shows are actually downloaded, then they’ll probably see viewership increase *slowly* for shows that may have never succeded in the first place, and probably bigger numbers through sweeps season — as they advertise prominently about the resolution of plot twists, and the introduction of new ones.