Boxee

For those of you on the bleeding edge and love what's going on in the tech world these days, check this out: It's called Boxee and its a very cool application for your computer and/or Apple TV) which allows you to play media from various sources..including streaming web video from various sites... all through one interface! And like most of my posts about software, this is absolutely FREE!

Now granted this is still in closed alpha release and you can only use this if you get in invite (if you want to try this out, leave a comment and I'll hook you up). But this thing is FREAKIN' COOL! The best part of this is the off the Internet Video portal. It pulls in sites such as Hulu.com, CBS.com, MySpace TV, and many others that have full TV episodes (both new and retro) as well as a limited selection of full movies! There are a few minor downsides: 1. The video quality is nothing near DVD or HD quality (I would say its what you were used to on an old analog picture tube TV or what you would see on the web) and 2. There are a few short commercials you have to sit through but for the price, this is simply great.

Even though this idea/technology/way of thinging is in it's infancy, this will be the future of TV/media distribution in the years to come.

* Check back for a post I'll have after I play around with Boxee on my hacked Apple TV!