Besides using Skype for instant messaging and video chats, a musician has found a way to use the service to his advantage – by giving his fans personal one on one concerts over the internet. Denison Witmer, a singer/songwriter, had to turn down a tour to spend time with his wife and newborn child but he still wanted to keep performing for other people.  Fortunately with the technology available today – he managed to make it happen.

(Via Ubergizmo.)

The BBC’s popular on-demand catch up service iPlayer has been released to the international community for a monthly fee. The app itself is free to download but use of the service will cost users €6.99 per month or €49.99 for the entire year.

At present the service is only available in Europe in the following countries: Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, The Republic of Ireland, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland. It is understood that the service hopes to launch in the US soon, although no date has been set.

The service will provide users with on-demand access to top BBC television and radio shows, many of which are currently sold via services like iTunes on a per-episode basis. Downloads from these paid content providers has risen 45.7% through 2010-2011, and the BBC hopes to capitalize on this rising popularity with the subscription model iPad app.

Speaking to paidContent, the BBC revealed that this ‘global iPlayer’ will differ from the UK’s current version:

The global BBC iPlayer app will be a different proposition to the UK on-demand service, which is partly based around catch-up of the BBC’s linear channels.  As such, programming will not automatically transfer to the global iPlayer – instead it will be an editorially curated mix of contemporary and classic programming.

In the UK, the BBC’s iPlayer service served 159 million requests in May 2011 alone.

(Via MakeUseOf.com.)

If you’re looking to set up a media center, you need to know what free software is out there. Choose the media center application that works best for you by comparing the best programs on the market.

If you’re looking for a program to watch your favorite videos from the comfort of your couch, you’re going to need a good TV media center program. These programs are designed to be readable and browsable from your couch, and present you with the media on the web and on your hard drive. All vary in terms of features, and all have something to offer. One of them is right for you. This list is by no means definitive, but it does cover most of the major players.

Browse the list, find more information. Try them all out if you have to; after all, all of these programs are free.

XMBC

It started as a media center for the original Xbox, but it’s evolved to become so much more than that. XBMC is considered by many to be the best media center out there, and it’s not hard to see why. Insanely customizable, and giving you quick access to your movies, music and TV shows, it’s simply a hard program to top. Like XBMC, but want more online content? Check out NaviX, the ultimate extension for XMBC. You’ll find lots of streaming content there, so enjoy.

Boxee

Built using code from XBMC, Boxee can seem overwhelming at first. There are TV shows, movies and more to browse, and even an entire App store. Start using it for a while, though, and you’ll wonder how you lived without it. That’s because Boxee allows you to customize everything enough that your favorite videos on the web are only a few clicks away.

Want to learn more? Read 5 things you should do after installing Boxee.

Hulu Desktop

Simply put: it’s all of Hulu’s videos, from your TV. There’s really not much more to this program; you can’t add your own videos, or watch any videos that aren’t on Hulu.com. This makes it useless outside of the USA, naturally, but assuming you’re in the States and most of the shows you like are on Hulu, this can be a good program to have around. Read more about the Hulu Desktop

Kylo

This one’s a little different. Basically a web browser built for television, Kylo is a pretty good media center in itself. Links to most of the major video sites on the web are easily accessible, and an interesting control paradigm makes for easy browsing. Sadly, Hulu is blocked, but there’s still a lot to discover here. If you want your media experience to be the web, try out Kylo.

Moovida

A slick user interface for browsing your own videos. While lacking in online content, Moovida is a great option for those looking to organize their desktop video collection. Lots of customization options await, so check it out!

Enna

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A recent addition to the field, Linux media center Enna comes with some capabilities not seen elsewhere. Support for couchbound book reading, for example and a pretty slick photo browser as well. This exciting new application also gives you access to your local music and videos, so give it a spin.

(Via MakeUseOf.com.)

I recently purchased a shiny new MacBook Pro and while it’s pretty awesome, I didn’t realize how much time it would take for me to re-adjust to a new operating system. Being fairly new to the whole Mac experience, I’ve been browsing the MUO archives for as many tips, tricks, and interesting tidbits I can find that will help me better learn the new OS. From researching free apps I should download to finding a good screen capture tool, I’ve found some great resources. I can finally edit photos again and, yes, even play games.

One of the things I was curious about however, was which universal video player to install. QuickTime is pretty cool, sure, but I quickly found out its limits after a short time using it. Where can I find a good, lightweight video player that’s capable of playing every type of file?

1. VLC Media Player

Regardless of what operating system you’re using, VLC Media Player is one of, if not the, best video players out there. VLC is an open source cross-platform multimedia player that plays pretty much every type of video file, making it truly ‘universal’.

You can also use it to play DVDs, CDs, VCDs, and various streaming protocols. No codec packs are needed and it’s completely free. Anyone who is familiar with VLC should not be surprised to see it on this list.

2. DivX

DivX Player for Mac is also a nice alternative for you to play videos, especially if you’re looking to play something in HD. Naturally, DivX Player allows you to play all native DivX videos (.mkv), but it does also support other popular video file types, including QuickTime files. The player also includes a desktop dimmer, window fade, and free full screen playback options.

3. NicePlayer

NicePlayer is a relatively unknown application but it’s a pretty impressive video player for Mac. Jeffry dedicated a post on MUO to NicePlayer back in June 2010. It’s an open source app that was designed for playing movies and it features full screen or border-less floating windows, on the fly playlist creation, and more.

4. Elmedia Player

Elmedia Player is a Flash and media player for Mac OS X that supports playback of FLV, SWF, XAP (Silverlight), RM and RV (Real), AVI, MOV, MP4, and many other formats. It features a built-in web browser, so you can browse through websites and watch movies without leaving the application as well.

5. Windows Media Components for QuickTime

You may be surprised to learn that this even exists, but it’s a viable solution if you’re just looking for a little bit of Windows love. With Windows Media Components for QuickTime, you can play Windows Media files (.wma and .wmv) directly in QuickTime Player and view Windows Media content on the Internet using a web browser. It gives you added support for numerous audio and video codecs, as well as different file formats (like .avi).

(Via MakeUseOf.com.)

If you’re a digitally aware couch potato like me, you risk burning a significant number of calories surfing between Hulu, Netflix, Amazon and iTunes to get your fix of movies and television shows.

If you’re interested in mitigating that risk, you’ll want to take a look at Moki.tv, an all-in-one guide to the Internet’s entertainment offerings.

From Moki, you can browse a broad and deep catalog of almost all the silver-screen and small-screen content available on the web. You can watch free content from Hulu; subscription stuff from Hulu Plus, Netflix, Amazon Prime and Comcast’s xfinity tv; and on-demand TV and movies from iTunes and Amazon Video On Demand. You can sign up with Facebook Connect, then simply select the content services you already use; Moki makes it easy to connect service with third-party authentication, so you won’t need to remember any logins.

Once you’re in, you’ll be able to rate movies and get recommendations — you can even pull your rating from Netflix to Moki and vice versa — and create a queue of shows and movies to watch. The site uses your ratings as well as ratings from IMDb, Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes to make recommendations for you; and the recommendations I got were spot-on, especially after I had imported my Netflix ratings.

Not only can you find and watch what you love without visiting a half-dozen websites; you can also find new shows and films to watch that are similar to ones you’ve already watched. You can sort content by genre, rating, popularity and release date; or you can browse award-winning films and TV shows. The site also has fascinating curated collections of content, like Shakespeare adaptations or Clint Eastwood flicks hand-picked by Eastwood himself.

In addition to getting boatloads of online video, you can explore trending lists of actors and directors, read synopses, write reviews, leave comments, and more. And perhaps best of all, if you signed up with Facebook Connect, you have an instant social connection and can see your friends’ ratings and reviews on content, too.

The site, though new, is remarkably full-featured; many of these cool features are made possible by clever integrations with existing sites and apps.

You can expect to see streaming media sources on Moki.tv soon. Currently, the site’s founders are polling users to find out which streaming sources are the most requested. Moki’s also working on an API.

We like the premise of the site — one-stop shopping for watching TV and movies online — and we like the UI, which is sleekly designed with lots of nice touches. Check it out for yourself, and let us know what you think.

Moki, Inc. is an San Francisco-based Y Combinator startup founded by Matt Huang, a recent MIT math grad, and another dev who is taking pains to keep his identity rather private. The company is currently hiring looking for local engineering talent.

(Via Mashable!.)

BBC recently released their iPlayer which allows you to watch many of the BBC shows on the web. Unfortunately for us, BBC does not allow users outside the UK to watch these shows. Luckily there’s a way around this. There are many sites recommending different software to use, but having tried many ways, this is the one I’ve found that works using Windows and Firefox: (note, you can also use instructions below to watch other content blocked from viewing within the US, or even to watch content only allowed in the US when you are abroad)

Step 1: Download and install the latest stable release of Tor using the default options. You can uncheck Privoxy in the install if you like. We will be using another proxy tool. (Tor is a tool that allows you to browse the web anonymously by routing your requests through various servers/proxies)

Step 2: We now need to ensure that the last server your request is routed through is a server in the UK. Go to https://torstat.xenobite.eu/. Click on the pulldown next to “CC:” and select “GB” and hit “search”. Now click on the “>” under “Exit”. You now have a list of servers in the UK that are allowed to be used as Exit Servers. Take note of all the nicknames of the servers except those marked Unnamed.

Step 3: Go to Start Menu and open All Programs -> Vidalia Bundle -> Tor -> torcc. This will open the Tor config file. Scroll all the way to the bottom and enter the following lines:
StrictExitNodes 1
exitnodes <list of the names you found in step 2 separated by commas>
An example of the second line above would be:
exitnodes anonion,anotherlink,colinwillsdorkyahoo
Save the file and exit notepad.

Step 4: Run Vidalia. After a few seconds, it should say “Connected to the Tor Network”.

Step 5: Install the Foxy Proxy addon for Firefox.

Step 6: When you install Foxy Proxy, it’ll ask you if you want to add a Tor proxy to it’s settings. You’ll want to set up the Tor Proxy to have the following 2 patterns: BBC iPlayer pattern – http://*bbc.co.uk/* and Tor Check pattern – http://torcheck.xenobite.eu/*

Step 7: Check that you’re exiting through a UK server by going to http://torcheck.xenobite.eu/index.php

There you go – now, when you have Vidalia and Foxy Proxy running, whenever you go to the iPlayer site, you’ll be able to watch videos. Note, that you’ll probably have to repeat step 2 and step 3 intermittently, as the same UK servers don’t always exist.

Hulu Desktop is a lean-back viewing experience for your personal computer. It features a sleek new look that’s optimized for use with standard Windows Media Center remote controls or Apple remote controls, allowing you to navigate Hulu’s entire library with just six buttons. For users without remotes, the application is keyboard and mouse-enabled. Hulu Desktop is a downloadable application and will work on PCs and Macs. It will initially launch as a beta product during which we plan to gather and incorporate user feedback to improve the service.

Version 0.9.10:

• This update includes general bug fixes for everyone and Hulu Plus support if you are a Hulu Plus subscriber. The update should be automatic for Mac and Windows users.
• **One known issue we’ve noticed – if you are already signed into your Hulu Plus account when the update installs, you may not see your entire queue. In this case, sign out and sign back in again, and your full queue should appear. Our apologies on this glitch – we should get it fixed soon.

• Intel Core 2 Duo 2.0 GHz.
• At least 2.0 GB of RAM.
• Mac OS X 10.4 or later.
• 2 Mbps Internet connection.
• Flash 9.0.124.

Download Now

(Via MacUpdate – Mac OS X.)

Netflix are not doing too badly at the moment, for they reported, ‘Apple TV has done very well for us, and in just four months has passed the also-growing iPad in Netflix viewing hours.’

This is added on top of their pretty-looking quarterly report.

(Via ZiggyTek Blog.)

Enterprising developer Erica Sadun of TUAW fame has been reverse engineering Apple’s Airplay technology lately, and now she’s following up her successful Airplayer software for the Mac with AirFlick, a simple piece of Mac OS X software that streams any video or audio file to your second-generation Apple TV — no iTunes required.

If you have been disappointed by how Apple has limited Airplay to their own iOS apps, you’re not alone. That’s why we’ve got to give mad props to Erica Sadun, a TUAW blogger and app developer who has been locked away tinkering with Airplay lately and found a way to extend some of its limited capability.

Sadun’s first effort was Airplayer, which allowed compatible iOS apps (including Videos on the iPad and the iPod app on iPhone/iPod touch, or YouTube on all three) to stream video to the Mac, thanks to a small OS X application she created.

Now Sadun is back with AirFlick, which streams most any video or audio file from your Mac to the second-generation Apple TV, no jailbreaking required. It also doesn’t require iTunes — drag and drop a media file onto the AirFlick application and away you go. Here’s how it works.

1. First you’ll need to download AirFlick, a modest ad-supported 1MB alpha application that Sadun is offering free on her website for the rest of us to play with. The current version is 0.04 as of this writing.

2. Unzip the archive and drag the AirFlick program to your system’s Applications folder.

3. Double-click AirFlick to launch it. The app will immediately start seeking out any compatible devices to stream to, which includes other Macs running Airplayer as well as the second-generation black Apple TV. When it’s ready, you’ll see ‘Searching’ change to the name of the first device found.

4. Select the device you want to receive your media from the choices listed; if you have only one, it will select it by default and you should see the name pop up like in the screenshot above.

5. Drag a video or audio file from anywhere (or type in a file path) and click the large Play button in the bottom right corner. Your media should start streaming to your selected device, although as you can see from Sadun’s how-to video, sometimes it doesn’t work on the first try. However, clicking the Menu button on your ATV remote and giving it another go will usually get things working as they should.

6. At this point, you can sit back and enjoy or click the Stop button if you’re finished.

AirFlick isn’t limited to just Apple TV-compatible files, either — if you have a newer version of the free, open-source VLC installed, AirFlick will use it to transcode your video into something that the ATV can play. The only caveat is there will be a 30-second delay before the video starts to play, during which Sadun slyly notes is a good time to ‘Get a cup of coffee.’

Keep in mind that this is early alpha software and bugs can be expected — we experienced one for ourselves while testing for this article after opening Airplayer on a secondary Mac and trying to refresh the available sources. Quitting the app and launching it again cleared things right up, and the problem didn’t occur a second time.

AirFlick and Airplayer show that there’s still a lot of untapped promise in Apple’s wireless Airplay technology, and thanks to developers like Erica Sadun, the best is likely yet to come.

Follow this article’s author, J.R. Bookwalter on Twitter