I'm running Sickbeard on my linux-based NAS. Not only does it download shows, but it automatically downloads shows as they air based on my preferences, copies, renames and organizes them, and when it's all done the DLNA server picks them up and makes them available to all my devices regardless of platform.

The only thing it doesn't do is watch them for me.

But to keep this on topic the fact that this sort of thing is not just possible, but possible to set up in an evening should be a fairly good indication that we're moving past the need to distribute things on DVD. It's orders of magnitude more convenient and if someone would finally wise up and provide this as an official solution, they'd probably make a small fortune.