What is Boxee? Well, Boxee is a must have application for anyone who loves television, movies, music, and pictures. In a nut shell, Boxee is a beautifully designed application that was created bring your digital media content from your computer to your TV. Whether you download movies illegally, stream them from Netflix, or even pull them in from free online sources all over the net; Boxee will make life easier for you.

Design

One of the many things that makes Boxee stand out from it competitors is its design. Boxee was designed with ease of use, beauty, and the Apple remote all in mind. The ease of use factor is just that. It is easy to use. Menus are laid out nice and orderly. Everything is easy to find, from a TV show on your hard drive to a episode of The Office from Hulu.com. I pointed out beauty, because Boxee stays faithful the the Apple beautiful design principles. Buttons are very large and colorful, text has nice hover and glow effects, colors flow beautiful, and finally, slide transitions are used when switching from page to page. While these might not seem important to a review, I find design a major factor in how much I like an application.

About 4 years ago Tivo announced they were working with Netflix to bring streaming movies to your TV. That was the last we heard anything about it. Now, Netflix streams to the PC, the MAC, and the XBOX 360. With all the advancements on the other systems, many thought that Tivo might have silently divorced Netflix. Well, it was just announced that Netflix and Tivo have started to role out a private beta of the new streaming functionality to a couple thousand subscribers of both services.

The Official Press Release:

TIVO AND NETFLIX ANNOUNCE PARTNERSHIP TO INSTANTLY STREAM MOVIES AND TV EPISODES FROM NETFLIX DIRECTLY TO THE TV THROUGH TIVO DVRs

Deal Provides Netflix with New Content Distribution Channel, Solidifies TiVo’s Leading Position as One-Box Solution for Simple Navigation and Delivery Of the Best Entertainment Content to the TV

ALVISO, Calif. and LOS GATOS, Calif.,  October 30, 2008 — TiVo Inc. (NASDAQ: TIVO), the creator of and a leader in television services for digital video recorders (DVRs) and Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX), the world’s largest online movie rental service, today announced that they are teaming up to provide Netflix and TiVo® Series3, TiVo HD, and TiVo HD XL subscribers with the ability to have thousands of movies and TV episodes instantly streamed from Netflix directly to their TVs.

The two companies said they are initiating a test of the new capability today in several thousand U.S. households and expect it to be broadly available in early December, in time for the holidays.  The ability to instantly watch content from Netflix on the TV via TiVo DVRs will be offered at no additional charge to customers who subscribe to both services.

The agreement provides Netflix with an important new technology partner to instantly stream a growing library of more than 12,000 choices of movies and TV episodes directly from Netflix to the TV.  It also solidifies TiVo’s leading position for simple navigation and delivery of the best entertainment content to the TV.

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I had heard rumors that this might occur, but it as been a while since I hard heard anything so I thought they decided to scrap that idea. Well, to my surprise, this morning I had an email waiting from Netflix saying:

Dear Chris,

As you may know, Blu-ray movies are more expensive than standard definition movies. As a result, we’re going to start charging $1 a month (plus applicable taxes), in addition to your monthly membership charge, for unlimited access to Blu-ray movies.

The additional charge for unlimited Blu-ray access will be automatically added to your next billing statement on or after November 5th, 2008 and will be referenced in your Membership Terms and Details. If you wish to continue getting Blu-ray movies for $1 a month more, you don’t need to do anything. If not, you can remove Blu-ray access anytime by visiting Your Account at the Netflix website.

If you have questions about this change or need any assistance, please call us anytime at 1-888-638-3549.

-The Netflix Team

As far as I am concerned, $1.00 is nothing, and I am going to pay it monthly so I can still get my beautiful Blu Ray films on a monthly basis. HD quality movies are just to good, so $1.00 is nothing!

What are your thoughts?

Empire Magazine has just published their 500 Greatest Movies of All Time, the result of “the biggest movie poll of all time. The list was collected by 10,000 Empire Magazine Readers, 150 of Hollywood’s Finest (including Quentin Tarantino, Sam Mendes, Mike Leigh, Guillermo Del Toro, Pedro Almodovar and Cameron Crowe), 50 Key Film Critics. I have included the top 50 below, click the link at the bottom to see the whole list.

1. The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972)
2. Raiders of the Lost Ark (Steven Spielberg, 1981)
3. Star Wars Episode V: Empire Strikes Back (Irvin Kershner,1980)
4. Shawsank Redemption (Frank Darabont, 1994)
5. Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975)
6. GoodFellas (Martin Scorsese, 1990)
7. Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979)
8. Singin’ in the Rain (Stanley Donen, Gene Kelly, 1952)
9. Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994)
10. Fight Club (David Fincher, 1999)
11. Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980)
12. The Apartment (Billy Wilder, 1960)
13. Chinatown (Roman Polanski, 1974)
14. Once Upon A Time In The West (Sergio Leone, 1968)
15. The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan, 2007)
16. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
17. Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976)
18. Casablanca (Michael Curtiz)
19. The Godfather Part II (Francis Ford Coppola, 1974)
20. Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982)
21. The Third Man (Carol Reed, 1949)
22. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (George Lucas, 1977)
23. Back to the Future (Robert Zemeckis, 1985)
24. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (Peter Jackson, 2001)
25. The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (Sergio Leone, 1967)