Online TV and Movies

So You like TV and Movies? Well I do to, however I don't like most of the stuff on cable, and I don't want to waste money paying for cable TV if there is an alternative. Luckily there is. For the last 3-4 years I have not payed for TV however I watch all the shows that I am interested in when I want to. (in the little spare time I have) You may ask how do I do it? Well, thats what I will be sharing with you today.

There are many places on the web where you can legally watch TV and movies. There are also some more questionable ways to watch TV and movies however we aren't going to go into that today. The different ways that you can watch stuff online are as follows, Website (Flash), Website (plugin), or program (bittorrent or streaming client). A couple examples of Flash websites that have plenty of content are Hulu.com and Joost.com. I have use both of these extensively and they offer good quality TV and movies for free.

If you are a Netflix subscriber you also have access to view  many movies and TV shows instantly. This does however require a plugin. If you are a firefox person you will have to run this through ietab, however as we speack I am watching the original episodes of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy full screened on my second monitor. "Don't Panic"  Netflix has done a great job of ensuring qulity, and smoothness.

If you would like to watch TV and Movies else where you can Check out Hulu.com and Joost.com both of witch offer a wide selection of TV shows and Movies. If you make a account with them (which is free) you can save things to a queue and be notified when there are new shows etc. This is a nice option for TV on the web because there are ussually options for hi quality and low quality, and you can pause any of these videos and watch them at your leisure. For people sponsored tv you can also turn to Democracynow.org.

Last of all are the programs. There are a few programs that will let you watch video streams, Winamp , TVUplayer , Miro, and Vuze. The first two do exactly that they play streams of video, and the pause feature is extrememly limited and ill advised. However the last two Vuze and Miro, are quite different. Vuze is a bit torrent client that recently has started making it easy for poople to release their video and other creations. You can choose to download them or play them. Miro on the other hand is still a video client, however it downloads videos or podcasts that you subscribe to (for free) and allows you yet again to play them when ever you choose. Unlike the other options for watching TV and Movies these last two can use up alot of space, however with space being so affordable nowdays, that really shouldn't really be a big concern. If you have questions or would like me to look over a program that you use, let me know by leaving a comment or contacting me.

"The Rage" Interview.

For those of you who missed the live broadcast of "The Rage" Exclusive interview, you can hear it again by clicking the play button on the Blogtalkradio player in the right hand of my Blog. There actually is special content that you wouldn't have heard listening live. So go enjoy.

Cool Beta's

Well I have been sitting on a beta called Joost for a little here. I wanted to fully experience it before I wrote a blog on it. You may be asking what Joost is. Well Joost is a program that allows you to basically have TV on demand. It is well put together, and seems to have the backing of many big names. My experience of Joost is very positive, and I am sure that many of you will like it also. Although it doesn't yet boast the newest content like ongoing news or other day to day shows, it does have a plethora of shows and movies to choose from with more being added everyday. Another cool feature of Joost are the widgets that can stream news let you talk to your friends and even keep you apprised of the weather. The resolution for most shows is quite good, and unlike many competitors, it streams to you so you don't have to download everything you wanna watch and then watch it wasting time and hard drive space. The ads are now worse than on tv, and actually better than TV ads in most cases being much shorter. As with any on demand content worth its salt, you can pause, or skip to the next show, or skip back a show.

If you would like to try it I believe it is still by invite only, however if you want an invite contact me and I will arrange it. Have a Great day. Ciao.

Trackmania Nations vs Trackmania United

Well its taken a while however after doing a bit of research (playing the games) I have finally come to a point where I can do a fair comparison. Today I am going to be reviewing Trackmania United (TMU) and comparing it against Tackmania Nations (TMN).(freeware version)

I found this game because I was looking for a cool free game to pass the time. I downloaded TMN from the Nvidia website. I was really blown away with the graphics and speed at which the game was played. Very addicting, I found the game to be a nice blend between racing, puzzles, and beauty.

A great way to waste time, or compete with your friends Trackmania has done something amazing. Out of a simple idea racing online. This game is not in any way ment to be a simulation, so if thats what you are looking for then you are out of luck. However this game does allow you to take your cars hundreds of miles per hour with no consequences.

With Trackmania United, this game has been fully polished. The user interface has been cleaned up to look much nicer and be much more user friendly. They way that you view stats and connect with your friends around the world has also been streamlines. The environments have been varied. All the best parts of the different trackmania games seem to have been mixed into this new game, ending up with a fast fun and visually beautiful game.

There are some downsides however. Not all of the cars handle reasonably, it seems that they didn't take the time to polish the controls of the cars, and some cars are very touchy and hard to drive. Not just to the point of making the cars unique but to the point of making certain cars no fun. It would have been nice to see them give each are their cars individual handling feel, while still maintaining playability.

I found that I played Trackmania Nations, much more because it was straight forward, one car and one style racing. Trackmania United its harder to find servers that have only the styles of racing that are fun. I sure hope that they patch the handling of the different car models, however, this game is very good.

I also looked at the graphics options, and other features of the game. Its nice to see that a person with pretty much any mainstream computer, can configure the game to work well for him, this does mean however that less powerful computer owners may not get all the eye candy, however they will still get to have all the fun.

In conclusion. If you want the eye candy and different environments offered in Trackmania United, you will enjoy your purchase, however you should probably check out Trackmania Nations first and see if that game is fun for you. If it is and you don't want to customize your cars paint or trade car models then TMN might be better for you.

• Biggest online race – 132 players took part in a single time trial race
• Largest content base of any racing game – The TrackMania Exchange website has over 150,000 user created tracks and over 200 unique cars
• First publicly available game developed specifically for an online competition TrackMania Nations was developed for the 2006 Electronic Sports World Cup and made available for free online. It has been downloaded over 30 million times
• Most nationalities in an offline racing competition – 34 nations entered the TrackMania event at the 2007 Electronic Sports World Cup
• Most popular online racing sim – The TrackMania series has over 3 million online registrations
• Most popular user created video – A trailer created by a TrackMania fan using in-game offstage has been viewed over 2 million times at GameTrailers.com

*Records taken from Guinness World Records 2008: Gamer’s Edition.
http://gamers.guinnessworldrecords.com/book.aspx