ArsTechnica covers an Accenture study which reported:

The results found that nearly half (47 percent) of those surveyed in the US want to be able to download movies, TV shows, and other video content to their television sets, with even more of those surveyed globally (54 percent) wishing for such technology.

This starts to support some of the theories that Paul Graham espoused in his essay The Power of the Marginal:

The big media companies shouldn’t worry that people will post their copyrighted material on YouTube. They should worry that people will post their own stuff on YouTube, and audiences will watch that instead.

If we get to a point where people can rouinely get video-based content via the web on their TV, that starts to put network programming and user-generated content on a more even playing field. They will have to compete for user’s attention on the big(ger) screen.