NEW YORK – Joining the trend of TV shows migrating to the Internet, a pair of episodes from the CBS comedies "Two and a Half Men" and "How I Met Your Mother" are being offered for free video streaming this week from the Yahoo! Web site.
Available through next Monday, the half-hour shows, which aired earlier this season, will be available in their entirety and without commercials, CBS and Yahoo! announced. It is the first time that Yahoo! is streaming episodes of a CBS television series in their entirety.
The episodes of "Two and a Half Men" (which stars Charlie Sheen, Jon Cryer and Angus T. Jones) are "We Called It Mr. Pinky" and "Madame and Her Special Friend."
The episodes of "How I Met Your Mother" (a freshman entry whose stars include Alyson Hannigan, Neil Patrick Harris and Josh Radnor) are "The Pineapple Incident" and "The Sweet Taste of Liberty."
Both shows are regularly broadcast Monday nights on CBS.
The special Webcasts are part of a growing movement of TV shows being made available to viewers through streaming video on their computers or via downloads to other devices.
For instance, with the recent introduction of Apple's video iPod, ABC began making available reruns of series including "Lost" and "Desperate Housewives" for download to iPods at $1.99 per episode. NBC offers same-night replay of "Nightly News" online at no charge.
TiVo has announced that, starting next year, any show recorded on its Series2 digital video recorders can be transferred to an iPod. And AOL will soon make available episodes from some 30 classic TV series for viewing on an online AOL channel.