joost beta
I received access to a beta account with Joost yesterday, which I was pretty excited about.
Joost (formerly codenamed “The Venice Project”) is a peer to peer internet TV application. I think it’s a great idea and it’s fairly well executed. Here’s some screenshots to get an idea for the program. The idea is to get a “near tv” quality signal that looks decent when viewed fullscreen.
The fullsize versions of the above are 50% of the size of my 1440×900 macbook pro screen.
All in all I’m impressed with the interface and channel/program selection. The program crashed on me a couple times – nothing major – and I discount that because it’s a relatively new port for OSX (Feburary), plus it’s still in beta.
My biggest gripe with the program is the not-quite-perfect P2P live streaming. I’m on a dual gigabit connection plugged directly in to the internet at my uni, so I know it’s not a bandwitdth thing, yet the video stalled for a second or two a few times while it was streaming from various peers on the internet. On the flip side though, this allows for many more on-demand programs to view at the click of a mouse.
The channel selection is pretty bare at the moment, but it’s filling in with what seems to be shows that are popular among my generation, as accentuated by the plethora of music channels, Top Gear, and various reality shows. Until they expand to more mainstream shows I don’t see it as a viable TV alternative for myself, but I’m sure they are working on getting more networks to sign on.
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