Boxee Committing Suicide

Have you ever heard of Boxee? It’s a company that produces media center software. Through a joint effort with D-Link they are about to release a hardware bundle called Boxee Box.

Pre-orders for the, as yet to be released, Boxee Box are presently being accepted on Amazon for $229. Silly names aside, that’s a pretty gutsy or stupid move for Boxee. Especially since Apple has announced that their second generation Apple TV product, which offers much of (though not all of) the same functionality as Boxee Box, will go on sale very shortly for $99! Also, already shipping devices from Western Digital and Roku are also priced below Boxee Box.

But, don’t be too harsh with Boxee and D-Link about the bad pricing. They were probably too distracted by the atrocious design that they came up with for Boxee Box to be worried about naming and pricing.

Do these guys really believe that people want yet another set top device that does not fit in with the rest? One that is obtrusive and aesthetically displeasing in most living rooms? What else have they failed to consider? Does this thing have a fan that howls like a banshee too? Or does the Boxee logo light up in a brilliant and distracting LED green?

Sorry Boxee, you took a ‘me too’ product idea and applied abysmal execution. You and D-Link seem to be the only ones that don’t know where this will end.