boxee and your TV go together like dill and pickle. This makes it a natural for an Apple TV. But it also makes adding a Mac mini to your home entertainment system even more tempting. If you've felt hampered by Hulu's insistence that you watch its content on your computer screen, boxee mixed with a TV makes a lot or sense, regardless of how you do it.

The social networking component also makes a lot of sense. While viewing or listening to content you have the option to rate it with a simple "Love it!" or "Nah..." as well as recommend it to all or a selection of your friends. Presumably you trust your friends' taste as they trust yours, making this a great way to discover new media.

And, finally, it's good for viewers as well as content providers. Those networks frustrated that viewers zip through advertising with their DVR's controls may feel a little better that there's no way to do that with the short commercials embedded in a lot of Internet streaming content. And because these advertisements are so short, viewers aren't going to kick too much about having to sit through them, particularly when they have access to entire seasons of quality programming for free.