boxee has just released a new version with the "App Box" (their version of the App Store), an RSS reader optimized for video feeds (including Hulu, Google Video, YouTube, and many others), and a long awaited auto-update feature. These features are included in boxee for Mac, AppleTV, and Windows (I was told that they will send out an update when Linux is available).
There is also an update with regards to our meetings with Hulu and their content providers below. Sadly, they weren't ready to work with them yet. When they are, they look forward to bringing a more robust version of the Hulu application back to boxee with their help.
boxee was started because there was an opportunity in the media center space for a product/company who put the user first, while respecting the rights of content owners. Over the past year and a half, they've listened to users, content owners, investors, working to create that platform. While I very happy with my traditional U-verse services, boxee expands its capabilities -- and to some degree illustrates a true disruption that big telecos and cable companies face.
Like many great product and technology breakthroughs, these guys did not come from an entertainment or cable background. The fact that it’s becoming easy to consume Internet video on a TV brings into question many of the industry’s business models that developed before the web. That’s part of the reason why Hulu asked to be removed from boxee. our meetings over the past week weren’t able to change that. but the people in the industry “get it”. they are users. they read the blogs. they talk with users. they are trying to adjust to a new reality, but they need time.
Users on the other hand, won’t wait. As seen over the past few weeks, users will take matters into their own hands to get the content they want. Witnessing this, the boxxee team decided to enable access to a user's favorite content using a new built-in RSS reader optimized for video. Like IE, Firefox, or Google reader, the RSS reader supports Google Video, Yahoo!, YouTube and feeds from many other websites. while it’s not as attractive or robust as our previous Hulu application, it will additionally support Hulu’s public RSS feeds.
The extended support for RSS is part of a new version of the boxee alpha (no update for Ubuntu, yet). it includes two new features that are still under development:
- App Box - this is a first take at an application “store” that makes it easy for users to install new apps and plugins. there is also native support for 3rd party repositories, so you don’t have to rely on boxee as a gatekeeper for what goes into the official boxee app store. for example, you can add dir.boxeehq.com as a repository to get access to all the boxeehq.com apps.
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- auto update - long time in the making and really bad form on our part for not having it from the beginning. but better later than never. no need to check on Twitter or our blog to know that there is a new version. now you’ll be prompted to update boxee whenever there is a new release ready.
This is a bleeding-edge release. not for the faint of heart since it did not go through much testing. I was told that the company is on track to release a more stable update on March 24th.
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