The Green Button strikes again! This time while taking a look around the other morning, I came across Macrotube. As the name suggests, the application provides a way to pull YouTube content into Media Center. Happily though, that’s not where the fun ends, but just begins.
While the application is still in development, a decent amount of content has already been added and the developer has stated in the thread that he’s working on more. His focus at this time is providing access to user generated content as opposed to podcasts or videocasts but he may consider those in the future. As of today you can find the following included with the installation:
YouTube | Daily Motion | Archive Classic TV |
CarPool | Cranky Geeks | Cult of UHF |
David Mitchel’s Soapbox | Earth-Touch | Economy Bites |
GeekbriefTV | HDNation | Lab Rats |
MSDN Channel 9 | MSN Soapbox | Revision 3 |
Science@ESA | Slate V Videocasts | TED Talks |
The iPad Show | Trailer Freaks | TWiT.TV |
One nice aspect of the application is that you don’t have to scroll through all of these sources if you don’t want to. You’re able to manage the sources you want to see on the main screen and only show the ones you want.
As well, it is posted that all of the current sources of content work on extenders, something dearly needed in this space. I haven’t had a chance to test this aspect though so I don’t promise anything.
In using the application for two days now (and I mean really using), I’ve found the UI to be smooth and relatively quick. There are times when thumbnails won’t display but usually a reload of the given page they come up.
As with any online content, quality varies. This of course has nothing to do with the application but the source. Some of the content sources are of classic content from the days before there ever was an internet and it shows but finding this content in other places can be a challenge. That said, being able to watch a few episodes of Gunsmoke never hurt anyone.
Hopefully the developer will continue to add resources. The structure of the UI is excellent, transitions are smooth and it ties into Media Center nicely. With the application still being in beta, I hold out strong hopes for MacroTube. That said, the developer hasn’t posted anything in the TGB thread since August. I hope this doesn’t mean a dead project. The base of the application is strong and with some more work this could be one of the best online content applications available to Media Center users.
3 days ago i meant to write basicaly the same article lol , well done guys and yes it is a very good deployment of online content in Media Center, i like TWiT.TV and now have a choice to either use this to stream and consume the TWiT.TV episodes i like or i use Media Center in conjunction with the Zune software to auto download netcasts and point MC to the Zune Netcast location to watch from my local machine