Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera is surprisingly good.
The stories are extended and varied rather than the constantly repeating 10 minute news chunklets that you get on a lot of channels. I'm thinking here primarily about CNN and BBC News 24 which are the other two free options you usually find on basic cable packages.
I like the less cluttered screen as well and the lack of advertising and constant trailers for coming shows, the content seems to me to be genuinely more varied and with less repetition than the competitors.
The news is a strange mixture of an international outlook, though of course with a focus on the Middle east, but with a western English language focus.
The team assembled to talk about the financial background to the fall out from the sub prime mortgage debacle was genuinely honest and insightful. They were a small team all in the studio and were given a lot of time to explain their thoughts across a narrow focus allowing you to think you got some insight into the situation rather than being simply entertained by it.
I liked the news show very much and was impressed by the mid-Atlantic focus of the show. It was more open to world events than CNN and less focused on the latest low points in English yob culture than News 24. I'm currently watching it for free due to an offer from my mobile phone provider and it isn't a channel I would have picked otherwise, I kind of assumed it would have too mid-eastern a point of view for me to get into. I have been pleasantly surprised and I'll be adding it to my usual CNN, Sky News, News 24 mix.
The look of the show, with its more complex graphics and dark subdued theme, is also a pleasant change from the louder and more bombastic excesses of some of the other channels. CNN's Situation Room is one of the more egregious examples of this, and it's nice to be able to concentrate on what is being said for a change.