Will On Demand save me from Big Brother hell?

Gemma Cartwright writes...

With the latest series of Big Brother starting in just a few hours time, I'm about to start making the very most of 'interactive' television. Nope, I won't be pressing the red button to vote for my favourite housemates or checking out teletext to see who's been evicted while I've been out drinking making important work contacts. Oh no my friends, I'll be using all the technology I have at my disposal to avoid everything remotely Big Brother shaped...

Even though we have a combined DVD collection that rivals most Blockbuster stores (and that's no exaggeration) most nights in my cosy little houseshare revolve around a joyous invention called an NTL box. When we got it all it was capable of doing was showing us a bit of digital TV (usually without a working tv guide...) and providing us with surprisingly slow broadband.

Then Virgin Media took over, and though we lost Sky One we did gain this wonderous invention called 'On Demand'. We had some of it when we were still NTL customers, but the menu rarely worked and everything seemed to cost extra. Now we have hundreds of great tv series and films at our disposal, it actually works (90% of the time) and I'm loving it.

So far we've worked our way through three series of Peep Show, a handful of episodes of Adam and Joe, some ill-advised IT Crowd, lots of The F Word and many, many episodes of Doctor Who, Torchwood and Doctor Who Confidential (did I mention my house is nicknamed 'Geek Central'?). On quiet days when I'm in the house on my own I catch up on awful Saturday night telly like 'Any Dream Will Do' and pray that one day the BBC will get round to putting Neighbours up there each day.

Virgin On Demand not be as swish as Sky+ or Tivo, but it's a good middle ground that suits me to a tee. If I had completely customisable television you'd be lucky if I ever left the house. On Demand picks the best stuff for me each week and offers it up on a plate for me to watch whenever I feel like it, but it doesn't allow to fill a box with crap shows I really should give up (Ever the hypocrite, I'll moan about Big Brother but I'm addicted to Shipwrecked).

Now that E4 will be full of awful wannabes parading around in their underwear instead of repeats of Scrubs and Friends, I'll be even more of an On Demand devotee than I already am. I should really get out more, I suppose, but it's raining, I'm trying not to drink as much, and I'm working my way through Nathan Barley...

Gemma Cartwright would like to put Big Brother into Room 101.