Neuros Solicits Help From AppleTV Hackers

JoeBorn writes "Highlighting the fact that Neuros officially encourages contributions to its open source device (GPL), it has published an open letter soliciting the help of AppleTV hackers. 'The transition to IPTV creates a golden opportunity to ensure that the gateway to the TV set becomes open to all.' Neuros draws a connection between open source and free media, and attempts to articulate why an open box can extend the freedom of the internet to the TV set."

Re:Why?

[Afecks]

Why should anyone interested in developing open solutions for set top boxes limit themselves to the OSD's closed embedded-style hardware

No, the question people should be asking is why buy the AppleTV if it's just another PC? I don't know about everyone else but whenever I get a new PC, my old PC becomes the media hub. It costs nothing extra and has more power than AppleTV could ever hope for. This seems like a product in search of a need.

Different motivation

[iamacat]

Apple TV hackers focus is legally running Cocoa applications on a $300 device. If you just want a Linux set top box, your best choice is probably a slightly used notebook. You get to customize hard drive space, gaming capabilities and so on according to your needs. Neuros attitude is golden, but does their hardware bring any additional value into the picture?

HDMI hack

[iheartbeer]

Quick, someone hack HDMI into it.

Re:Why?

[Slashcrap]

Why should anyone interested in developing open solutions for set top boxes limit themselves to the OSD's closed embedded-style hardware, when Apple has provided a full PC that you can run whatever you want on (Mac OSX, linux, MythTV, etc...) in a nice neat package for almost the same price ($229 vs $299)?

Sorry, just a minor correction - Apple have actually provided a full PC which they will do everything within their power to stop you running Mac OSX, Linux & MythTV on.

The fact that Apple are shit at that kind of thing, and their protections usually end up being defeated within a few days by a bunch of 15 year old Romanian hackers does not make them a champion of open platforms.

I know it's difficult to see the difference when you have been blinded by the intense sunlight eminating from Mr Job's ringpiece.

Re:Why?

[NMerriam]

Apple have actually provided a full PC which they will do everything within their power to stop you running Mac OSX, Linux & MythTV on.

Huh? Since when has Apple made even a token effort to stop people from running different software on their hardware? They do try to stop running OS X on foreign hardware (but they don't waste a lot of developer resources on it) but that's a very different thing.

Compare how easy it is to load a completely different OS on the AppleTV:
1) write new OS to drive.
2) Apple publicly says they won't do anything via updates to try and stop people from doing it
2) Done.

vs what it took to turn the XBox into a standalone media device:
1) Order potentially illegal mod kit
2) Solder delicate wires to tiny holes
3) Flash hacked firmware (pray you don't screw up, or goto 1)
4) Boot from illegal CD/DVD
6) Install illegal software.
7) Be sure never to load any dashboard updates from MS, since they will all try to brick the machine
8) Done!

Re:is this better than an XBMC?

[in5ane]

Surely this isn't true any more? People have been saying this for ever, and it was believable in 2003...

I realise my friends and family are mostly nerds, but most of them have HDTVs, and this is in the UK, where apparently our uptake of HD is lower than the US.