For the college generation, e-mail has replaced snail mail, AIM and cell phones have taken the place of the room phone and soon the Internet could render televisions obsolete.

More and more people are using the Internet to watch cable TV. Whether to get a sports game the cable provider doesn’t carry or to catch up on last week’s episode of a show without having to wait for the rerun, students around the country are turning to their computer screens.

Allison Bennett, sophomore at Tarleton State University of Texas, just recently began using the Internet to watch sporting events.

“I watched the OU [Oklahoma University] game online because that channel was not coming in on our TV,” Bennett said.

Watching the OU game was the first time Bennett ever used the Internet to watch TV. She said she would use streaming video again if her cable provider didn’t offer a program she wanted to see.

Some colleges, such as Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, are encouraging their students to watch cable through the Internet by providing links and connections.

Dartmouth went wireless in 2001 and introduced the “Video Furnace”— video-over-the-network— system this year. Video Furnace allows students to access cable TV from any computer on campus.