Via eHomeUpgrade.com, there’s an interesting piece of software called AnyTV which lets you browse and play any video streams that it finds on the internet. According to the site, its features include:

- 2630+ Online TV channels
- 6910+ Video clips
- 4750+ Online Radios
- Dayly updates
- Rating System
- Regular or full-screen mode
- No additional equipments required
- Multiple formats support (Windows Media & RealVideo)
- Easy to use
- Free
- Full-screen mode
- Channels from more than 100 countries.  

I’d like to see an MCE plugin for this; that would be super cool for my home setup.

I thought I’d give a shout out to TivoBlog.com, one of my favorite daily reads, and they are giving away a TiVo Series 2 for one lucky individual.  If you don’t normally visit them, now’s a good time to add them to your daily RSS habit.

There has been a growing buzz that Microsoft will make a big announcement next week at CES in regards to the Xbox 360 and via The Escapist, it looks like Microsoft may license the platform  to other companies.  According to the article: 

According to a Joystiq report, Seattle Times columnist Brier Dudley has suggested Gates may announce that Microsoft “may be preparing to license the Xbox gaming platform to consumer electronics companies.” If true, outside manufacturers such as Toshiba could build Xbox 360-based gaming consoles that would also integrate other technologies, such as DVR capabilities and an HD-DVD drive. Toshiba is tied closely to the speculation due to previous rumors that the company was already at work on a new and more advanced Xbox system.

This could be a great move by Microsoft which has been struggling on the XBox hardware front with many hardware failures. While now the XBox brand is only associated with gaming, it has become more of a powerhouse for video playback including full support as an MCE extender, as well as a UPnP media streamer.

Next week will be interesting.

Via TVPredictions.com, NetFlix is partnering with LG to add NetFlix downloadable movie functionality on LG’s combo HD-DVD / Blu-Ray device.   While the device is expensive ($999), I’d assume we’ll be seeing lots of announcements about this service in similiar products including game consoles, as has been rumored for some time now.  It’s a good move for NetFlix, but with a lot of competitors entering this space, it’s going to be all about the partnerships with content holders to get good downloadable content and device manufacturers like TiVo, XBox, and PS3 which are already in the living room and have internet access.