At long last, a new TV season is starting with actual interesting stuff. As far as mainstream TV goes, I'm elated with the return of Burn Notice and the impending triumphant returns of Entourage and Top Gear. I hope Californication finds its way in there too.
But I've also found something a little less seasonal: Current. It's a new-ish network on cable and satellite, and it had its own circulation in the news recently when it turned out that the two reporters abducted by North Korea back in the spring worked for the channel.
Also, Al Gore founded it.
And as Al Gore's baby, it's a pretty big hit. It's intelligent, tech-savvy, and of course very green, all while being entertaining. They've established a delicate balance of informative, eye-opening, and funny, and most of the programming is geared to fit in time slots much smaller than 30 minutes: they know their audience.
Quite possibly the best show is InfoMania, a 30-minute sardonic look at the week's news as reflected by the ADD-o-sphere, a word I just made up to aggregate the blogosophere, Twitter, and cable news channels.
Most of the shows are free downloads in any format (iTunes podcasts go along with traveling very well, I've discovered), so give them a shot. If you're even a quarter of the giant techie nerd dork I am, you'll be entertained, and possibly even enlightened.