How so?  I get network TV (HD over clear QAM and analog SD) with a Hauppauge 950Q hybrid tuner.  I watch or record shows using this through Windows 7.  The WMC wizard detected the tuner and walked me through setting it up.  Works great.

I get cable channels through various sources including Hulu and TV.com as well as the cable networks themselves.  I do this through Clicker.com which is to my TV viewing what Google Reader is to my internet surfing.  When Boxee gets its browser in order, it may replace Clicker, because I love the Boxee TV interface.  Sadly, whether or not the show will ever appear once it is chosen in Boxee is hit and miss.  I bat about .500.  I do use Boxee and its remarkable, astounding, boy-do-I-love-it bookmarklet to add internet videos to my video queue for later viewing.  (You know, like when I’m not at work.)  Somehow it seems less cumbersome than adding, viewing, and subtracting something from my favorites.  I did add the HeatWave weather, Hulu desktop, RadioTime, and Media Browser plug-ins to my WMC.

Windows Media Center’s internet television is terrible.  The flashy cover flow interface is much more likely to lead you into a sea of clips when what you are looking for is a full episode.  (The lackluster search function has a full episode filter.)  There is no means of subscribing to full episodes of a show like you have in Hulu, Clicker and Boxee.  There is no native weather menu.  The movie library seems to scrape metadata with a low success rate.  Internet radio is provided through Live365.com which has music but not broadcast radio stations.  To me the only reason to have something besides the Pandora, last.fm, Slacker-type music is to have actual broadcast radio.

XBMC is the most awesome means of viewing local media and does a nice job with the weather.  Its lack of interface with TV, IPTV, Internet Protocol Radio, and internet videos has caused me to retire it from my HTPC.

Boxee is the champion of the queueing up the internet (mostly YouTube) videos I want to watch.  If it straightens out the issue with getting a cable television episode started in its browser consistently, it will play a much more significant role in my daily media perusal.  (Potentially replacing Clicker.)  This is in spite of, not because of, its narcissistic assumption that I want to be told what Avner (or even a real friend) is watching or what Boxee has chosen to feature.  If I want Boxee’s opinion, I’d rather ask for it than have it jammed in my face.

In summary, if WMC can address its shortcomings, it is in a position to become king of the HTPC hill.  Neither MediaPortal or GB-PVR is comparable.  (Ask your Mom to set up the EPG in either of those and tell me how it goes!)  For now, I’ll use a handful of plug-ins with WMC to access local media for videos, movies, recorded TV, music,and photographs as well as live TV, radio, and Netflix movies.  I’ll use Clicker to access streaming TV and Boxee to catch up on my internet videos.  But I don’t know what I’m going to do when World Cup Soccer starts and I can’t see it in HD.  Anyone want to meet me at the pub?  It’s about time I got out of the house, anyway.

Update 2009 08 20 Tried it on my HTPC without Power Point Viewer and the exe file didn’t work but asked for an Office key.  So much for portability.  (Not that I’ve given up.)

Today, I want to talk about the web applications that really do enrich my life.

Poor old MS Outlook is lonely these days.  I never call and I never write.  I left her on my desktop for my Gmail in the cloud.  As someone who spends a lot of time on computers that belong to someone else and carries an iPhone between computer stops, Gmail is my email client of choice.  Label an email so it can be filtered and retrieved with similar emails.  Archive it to clear your inbox but still have that email handy in All Mail.  Skin it with a theme to give it the appearance you want.  Easily search through all your emails to retrieve just that item you were needing but archived in the oh so distant past.  It is the only chat agent I use.  Click on the Gmail labs beaker icon and customize this little sucker to stand on its head if you like.  (For example, check out how Gina Trapani tricked out her Gmail.)  Excuse me a moment, I have to break up this love fest between my iPhone and my Gmail.  Ah, shoot, never mind, let them have their fun.

Moving on.  My family is literally scattered around the world.  Email and chat are good, but for video chat, Skype gets my family’s vote.  In an unscientific trial my wife and I talked to each other using Gmail’s video chat and then Skype and determined that Skype had less lag and more immediacy.  No matter how bad the video quality, it is so cool to actually see folks smile (or give you that “is that supposed to be funny?” expression).  My son even “showed” me his new apartment!

The only radio I use these days is in my car and pretty much just to hear the news on NPR when I drive to work in the morning.  The rest of the time I am a Pandora-whora.  On a computer or on my iPhone, Pandora has not only replaced music on the radio (with the exception of internet radio) but cut significantly into my iPod listening.  Create up to 100 “stations” that play music that sounds similar to a song or artist of your choice.  Pandora uses over 400 parameters to identify music that will satisfy the “if you liked this” – “then you’ll like that” criteria.  It works quite well and provides greater variety than my own playlists.  Occasionally, I even happen on an artist who is new to me.

Lastly, I hope the cable company is shaking in their boots.  In fact, I’m sure they are.  Cable internet services are beginning to put quotas on the how much you can transfer or throttle the rate of transfer.  I believe this is directly related to (and in my non-lawyer opinion an unfair trade practice) restricting our ability to enjoy alternate viewing services like the now famous Hulu and its competitor Joost.  ABC is coming soon, but Hulu offers links to view Lost, et al, on the ABC viewer.  Unfortunately, if there is a way to subscribe to ABC or CBS shows on Hulu, I have yet to find it.  In a very non-public spirit PBS offers only a slim percentage of its shows on the internet.  Most other networks are readily available.  Hulu allows one to subscribe to one’s favorite shows and even get an email when a new episode is available.  Now, if your computer is connected to your TV (mine is), Hulu not only begins to threaten cable, they also begin to nip at the heels of my beloved TiVo.  Of course there are other ways to enjoy your shows (Fancast, network sites, etc.), but I like Hulu’s subscription-to-a-show feature.

Google has a ton of other web apps, documents, calendar, etc., but with DropBox, my use of those apps is minimal.  Current project documents, bookmarks, and my KeePass database are always available to me in my DropBox folder or at their website.

My guess is you guys have different faves and I’d love to hear about them in the comments.  What am I missing?