I don't know about every gym, but the one I attend (YMCA)has TVs lined up along one wall. Obviously all of the cardio epuipment is facing that direction. There's never anything good on- news, news, and more news. I don't watch the news, it's always depressing, covering all the violent, horrible things that happen to individuals and/or groups of people. Or it's Obama or McCain yammering on. Watching them reminds me of writing papers for English class in highschool. Saying the same things over and over in different ways so it seems like something new. They don't have the sound on, but it's all captioned so you're reading it even if you don't want to plug in to hear it. The only thing I plug into is my Ipod, almost as loud as it will go, so that A) I can't hear the lame muzak playing overhead B) I can't hear the diarrhea-of-the-mouth non sweating socializers blah blah blah-ing C)no one tries to converse with me. I always try to get the treadmill in front of the history channel, at least the news they report is old, ancient even, and they often have realistic reenactments performed by the world's best actors. Today the topic involved China, there were a lot of battles and bloodshed. At one point, they were all in armour hacking away at each other with their swords, and the caption said (shouting in Chinese) with the english translation "AAAHHH! AAAHHH! AAAAHHH!" What does "aaahhh" sound like in Chinese exactly? For once I wish I would've been plugged in.