Get That PC Out Of My Living Room!

Mike Krisher, responding to Marc Canter’s post about Media Center, says:

But that they prefer Tivo. What’s the difference? A Tivo is a PC. It may not be the familiar Windows interface, but I’m not so sure that is a bad thing.

Yes, Tivo may be a PC, but it’s not a Windows PC; it’s a diverged device which pivots on the commodity hardware of the PC architecture.

As for the “familiar” interface, Marc hits the nail on the head:

They want interfaces designed for the TV.

And Windows is not that interface.

Looking up info on the net at the same time I was watching a show would be pretty nice.

Yes, but this should be structured, contextual search. Whenever I’m watching TV, I usually only want to look up something on TV Tome which I currently do with my Treo. I don’t want to have to bring up a browser, and I sure as hell don’t want to type anything, I just want a quick route to the info.

And I definitely don’t want any kind of PC, even if “the OEMs have caught on to” the fact that you have to design the boxes differently. OEMs don’t do industrial design.