In a post this weekend, I wrote about how the cable tv industry was finally stepping towards the cliff. And we’d learn more today when Comcast, the largest U.S. cable operator, reported earnings. Well, the numbers are out, and it’s not a surprise.
275,000 Comcast subscribers cut the cord last quarter. Its subscriber count is down 3.5% from the same quarter last year. To be fair, some of that… → Read More
The title of this post is both a very old idea and a very new one. With the prevalence of fiber connectivity and pervasive broadband speeds, this year has been a hot one for bringing together the home computer and the living room TV. While companies like Apple and Google battle over share of TV viewers, they have left open and promoted the web for content distributors to control their own… → Read More
Among companies I loathe, Comcast is right up there. Alongside Expedia and AT&T, they share the common thread of having typically poor service, and even worse customer service. But I’m a forgiving guy. I’m willing to give Comcast a second chance. Well, for 6 months at least.
I’ve been a Comcast customer a few different times at various points of my life. Each time I’ve had an awful… → Read More
Boxee, the social network-y media center for Windows, Mac, and Linux, has a fancy new App that may interest you, particularly if you’re a sports fan. It allows you to watch live games of the United Football League right from within the Boxee software. → Read More
The other players are scrambling to set themselves in opposition to the new Apple TV: earlier this week, Roku dropped their prices preemptively; Amazon is touting 99-cent shows; now, Boxee is pricing their long-awaited Boxee Box. It’s $199, and they defend the price in a blog post, saying that people really do want the extra features it offers. I’d tend to agree, but in the end… → Read More
The Boxee Box is now one step closer to your livingroom seeing as the FCC recently put the remote through its testing process. There’s not a whole lot of new info to be found. It still sports the oh-so-helpful QWERTY keypad on one side and simple navigational controls on the other. The FCC boys did find it necessary to tear it apart, reveling the single circuit control board. Hopefully this… → Read More
Some Boxee news for you, as we all sit back and watch the Barcelona-Milan friendly. (Good to see Ronaldinho get such a nice reaction from the Camp Nou crowd. I haven’t seen him this happy in years!) The company has decided to add a Movie component to its much celebrated TV-watching interface. The gist is, just as you can watch TV programming with Boxee, you’ll be able to watch movies. Boxee… → Read More
The future is almost here for Boxee. A few months ago the company announced plans to bring premium for-pay content to the platform. This goal is now one step closer thanks to an agreement with Vindicia who will handle the payment transactions.
The goal is to provide a one-click payment scheme using Vincdicia robust CashBox system as a back-end. The powerful solution currently handles currency… → Read More
The news is a bit aged but Boxee Beta is now on the Apple TV which means folks who updated to the latest ATV firmware can now get their media fix on. How do you get it? Hop over here, make a nice little patchstick, and rock out.
Boxee has full instructions right here and here’s our quick how-to. → Read More
Finding quality video content on the web is hard. There’s too much porn, or too many lolcats derivatives, and not enough crazy music videos involving LEGOs. Following John’s Posterous is one good way to find serendipitous content you might enjoy, but there’s only one John, and he does occasionally sleep. If only someone would make an app to crowdsource my web viewing, so that only the best of the… → Read More
Both Boxee and Windows Media Center are amazing and among the most popular media playback programs. However, they don’t really work together as they are both more platforms than anything else. You have to close out of one program to start the other and that’s not an easy task if you’re controlling your HTPC with just a remote from your couch. Enter Boxee Windows 7 Media Center Integration 1.0… → Read More
If I may, I’d like to play devil’s advocate to something I wrote a few days ago. To quickly summarize, Boxee took issue with NBCU’s Jeff Zucker’s characterization that Boxee was some sort of rogue piece of software, and that Hulu is in the right whenever it blocks access to the XBMC-derived media player. How about this: maybe Hulu is right to block Boxee? Let’s see where this takes us. → Read More
The world’s worst manager, Jeff Zucker, who just so happens to be the president of NBC Universal, was on Capitol Hill today trying to persuade lawmakers to allow the proposed merger with Comcast go through. Interesting to note his take on Boxee’s relationship with Hulu, which, you’ll recall, has been something of a mess. Boxee adds Hulu compatibility, Hulu breaks said compatability, Boxee re-works… → Read More
Boxee has just announced their new Payment Platform, a system to offer pay-per-view and subscription content to paying customers. Boxee expects to take a small percentage of the payment – under 30% – for the service. This would in turn enable services like PayTV and a la carte media downloads, an important part of Boxee’s monetization plan. With the launch of the Boxee Box and… → Read More
As far as XBMC forks go, Boxee certainly appears to have the most heat. It has VC money pouring in, flashy deals with content providers, and you’ll soon be able to buy a dedicated D-Link box to more easily use it on your TV. But Boxee isn’t the only XBMC-based media center that’s worth your time. It’s not even the first XBMC fork to go out and make a name for itself. Plex, which is exclusive to… → Read More
Boxee fans, today’s your lucky day: the service has just released its Beta to the general public. You can download the new version of the streaming video hub here.
The new version is really a complete overhaul of the app — it’s received a new, sexier UI that makes it easier to browse through the service’s content (and anything you might have saved locally too). Niceties include the ability to… → Read More
Read the headline again and smile. This little box just got a whole lot cooler. Now, how about the price. → Read More
D-Link just went official on the Boxee Box. But they still didn’t answer our only last question: the price. All they said is that it will be less than $200. Thanks, we kind of figured that along with that the device will stream media from various big-name sources like Netflix, Pandora and Last.fm. Stay tuned though, more info is likely going to drop at CES in a day or two. → Read More
Looks like Boxee will release an iPhone App to control its upcoming set-top box, developed jointly with D-Link. The App will be on display at CES next week. Oh, God, CES is next week. With any luck Las Vegas will mysteriously disappear à la “Lost” before the show starts. That would truly be ideal. → Read More
Standalone set-top boxes like the Boxee Box and the Roku Player are good because they add Internet content to heretofore unconnected TVs. That’s a good thing. However, analysts at the Diffusion Group believe that the devices will eventually peter out to be replaced by Blu-Ray devices. → Read More
Everyone, where everyone means Internet nerds, has been talking a lot about the Boxee Box the last few days. For good reason too. It brings the ultra-cool software to your living room in an official product. AppleTV hacking will soon not be required to use Boxee on your HDTV. But with all the talk recently, some points have been missing. No more, Andrew from Boxee just posted a bunch of info… → Read More
We know Boxee. We like Boxee. And when we heard Boxee was planning on dropping some dedicated hardware, our hearts… well, maybe they leapt a little bit, but there was also some skepticism there. Part of the fun of Boxee has been its hardware-agnostic nature. Put it on your AppleTV, put it on your micro-PC, put it on your iPhone — whatever. Would dedicated hardware take away the fun? → Read More
I don’t watch a lot of television programming, and I’m not particularly patient with the way “Big Media” treats me, the consumer. I really wanted to like Flash Forward, but it’s pretty clear that the show is more interested in hitting that 100 episodes mark to earn syndication than it is in delivering an interesting, gripping story. So I gave up on that, and on a lark decided to try Fringe, to… → Read More
Boxee is only days away from announcing the details about its upcoming hardware venture, and the good news keeps rolling. Crackle, which is a site I’ve never heard of but is apparently a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, is the latest video site to be available on Boxee. Actually, this is really good news for Boxee users. Crackle has some great shows. → Read More
We’ve seen in the past year that Hulu gets testy about their video content being used on other sites or platforms, with Boxee and TV.com both forced to remove Hulu content from their sites and applications. Now startup Rippol is facing the same fate.
Rippol just publicly launched their video discovery sites at yesterday’s Real-Time CrunchUp, which combines both complex algorithms with user… → Read More
Boxee, everyone’s favorite HTPC software, just announced that the company just partnered with its first CE company. But that’s all the company is saying. We don’t know anything else. However, there is an event coming up on December 7th right around the corner from John’s house where we should learn more. I’m already excited though. Just think what this means. → Read More
Think of the Myka ION as a nettop built for your HDTV. The little media streamer utilizes an 1.6 GHz Intel Atom 330 CPU and an NVIDIA ION GPU to provide your TV with quality high-definition content. Actually, the Myka ION is more computer than dedicated media playback device, which is good thing. Well, a Linux-powered computer with Boxee and XBMC installed, that is. → Read More
We recently wrote about the real-time update and redesign of Cliqset, a Friend-Feed-like online identity platform that lets users merge and share a vast variety of social information, including status updates, location, photos, and more, onto one platform. Cliqset aims to be a one-stop-shop for social communications, pulling in content from close to 70 social networks and services, including… → Read More
Boxee, the media center software startup, has won a lot of fans with its open approach to streaming content. And as a result it has won some more money, to the tune of a $6 million second round, led by Boston’s General Catalyst Partners. The new money will be used for growth: Both expanding the team and expanding the service’s reach in the market, we’re told.
But why now? After all, Boxee raised… → Read More
Boxee, the media center software startup, has won a lot of fans with its open approach to streaming content. And as a result it has won some more money, to the tune of a $6 million second round, led by Boston’s General Catalyst Partners. The new money will be used for growth: Both expanding the team and expanding the service’s reach in the market, we’re told.
But why now? After all, Boxee raised… → Read More
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