Distribution
In 2008, House was distributed in a total of 66 countries. With an audience of over 81.8 million worldwide, it was the most watched television show on the globe and far surpassed the viewership figures of the leading TV dramas the previous two years (CSI and CSI: Miami). The following year, it placed second in the world after CSI.
House episodes premiere on Fox in the United States and Global in Canada, which have identical schedules. The show was the third most popular on Canadian television in 2008. That same year, House was the top-rated television program in Germany, the number 2 show in Italy, and number 3 in the Czech Republic. The series is also very popular in France, Spain, Sweden, and the Netherlands. In the United Kingdom, the first four seasons were broadcast on Five. Sky1 acquired first-run rights beginning with season five. The original, English-language version of the show also airs in Australia on Network Ten, in New Zealand on TV3, and in Ireland on 3e, TV3's cable channel.
Episodes of the show are also available online for download: Amazon Video on Demand, iTunes Store and the Zune Marketplace offer episodes from all of seasons 1 through 8. In 2007, NBC Universal (the show's distributor) and Apple Inc. (iTunes' owner) had a disagreement that temporarily kept the fourth season off iTunes. In a statement to the press, Apple claimed that NBC Universal wanted to drive up the per-episode price to $4.99. In September 2008, it was reported that the issue between Apple and NBC had been resolved. Episodes can now also be purchased in HD on iTunes for $2.99. Recent episodes are available in streaming video on Fox's official House webpage and on Hulu.com.
The first seven seasons of the show were released on DVD encoded for regions 1, 2 and 4. A boxed set comprising seasons one through seven has been issued, as well. Universal Studios Home Entertainment announced plans to rerelease the first season in region 1 in anamorphic widescreen (the original release is letterboxed). It is unclear if the DVDs will be re-released with anamorphic widescreen in regions 2 and 4, where they have been presented in 4:3 fullscreen.
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Famous quotes containing the word distribution:
“The man who pretends that the distribution of income in this country reflects the distribution of ability or character is an ignoramus. The man who says that it could by any possible political device be made to do so is an unpractical visionary. But the man who says that it ought to do so is something worse than an ignoramous and more disastrous than a visionary: he is, in the profoundest Scriptural sense of the word, a fool.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“There is the illusion of time, which is very deep; who has disposed of it? Mor come to the conviction that what seems the succession of thought is only the distribution of wholes into causal series.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“My topic for Army reunions ... this summer: How to prepare for war in time of peace. Not by fortifications, by navies, or by standing armies. But by policies which will add to the happiness and the comfort of all our people and which will tend to the distribution of intelligence [and] wealth equally among all. Our strength is a contented and intelligent community.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)