Appletell | Apple, Mac, iPhone, iPod | News, Rumors, Reviews, How-Tos

Boxee is a new application for the Mac that is much like Front Row, only better—in theory. It is an open source effort, meaning that plug-ins can be added and it can be modified by others besides the developers. It is currently in a private alpha stage, and I just so happen to be a private alpha member, and I figured I should bring a preview to you.

When Boxee launches, even if there is only one account present, you are greeted with a screen where you can choose between accounts. Using a keyboard, mouse (if enabled) or a remote, you choose the account you want to log in to. The account doesn’t dictate the media you can access; rather, it dictates your “recommendations” and “friend activity”—one place where Boxee sets itself far apart from Front Row.

Whenever your friends watch or listen to something, unless they have dictated it a private source, it will show up on your home screen. Recommendations are based upon what your friends listen to or watch, and also what you like. Likewise, whenever you listen to or watch something, it will show up for your friends, unless you dictate it as a private source. This is fairly easy to do, but not readily obvious, an issue that plagues Boxee.

In my article about making AppleTV (and Front Row) better, my number one request was to integrate streaming TV from sources such as Hulu and ABC.com. While Boxee has not gotten there (due to the Flash containers used by Hulu shows), it is much closer than Apple, and Boxee developers have expressed interest in adding Hulu support. However, I am still more inclined to use Front Row over Boxee on my forthcoming home entertainment setup, and it’s because of the UI.

The Front Row user interface could not be made any simpler. On the flip side, the Boxee interface has no room to cram anything else in, and is rather unintuitive. As seen in the above screenshot, Boxee has some inexplicable design choices. Here in the Music section, the option to choose internet sources is grouped along with the choice of “My Sources” and all of my album artists. Having all the options is both intimidating and completely un-hierarchical. Common sense would dictate that I should choose between Internet and My Sources, then choose by Artist. One last issue is that changing view settings is easy, but tedious, and view settings must be changed per the individual menus, of which there seem to be infinitely many.

Overall, for an alpha build, Boxee is really great and has great potential. It is, however, a ways off from becoming my choice for a Home Entertainment hub.

Boxee is available for Mac and Linux. You can sign up for the private beta at boxee.tv.