Next gen of TV.

I started getting interested with this stuff back when I first started watching Pure Pwnage. The concept of downloadable content by people for people intrigued me. Once I started researching it, there seemed like a lot of info on it starting pouring in through tech news sites like slashdot and digg.

I've been following an OSS project based on this idea by the Participatory Culture Foundation with this idea:
http://www.participatoryculture.org/

And now it seems like a lot of people - particularly tech people, like ex-TechTV staff - are jumping on this. I think most people see it as the next logical step from podcasting. The technology is at the right point, too, for it to jump right in - BitTorrent continues to grow in popularity, and I think people want to see it put to use legitimately.

So what do you think about all this? Are you interested in free amateur web shows? I think TV sucks outside of a few shows, and after watching great web shows like thebroken and Pure Pwnage (and tonight, the premiere of Systm - check it out), I really want to see people releasing special interest programs like that.

I'd be all for it. This is one of the best ways to get new creative material out to several people at once. It would be the equivalent of Internet bands that rely on free mp3 trading to get the word out about their music.

I wonder if torrenting movie files can actually be integrated into television channels, so that it would feel more like watching TV and less like sitting in front of your computer watching an AVI of something.

I have heard of subscription model set-top boxes that plan to do something akin to that, but I think it's for mainstream channels.

An alternative is to have a seperate media player box set up running one of these services using TV-out to run on your TV. I've used my normal desktop machine for watching anime on a normal TV and it's always worked great, so it's definately a viable option.

It's an really interesting idea, but u should have an very powerful computer to see the tv.

Actually, no, not really. Any old machine capable of playing back video would be fine for it, as long as there was a video card in it with TV out.

i hope my old machine can allow me to see it.