engadget.com
I imagine that there might be some of you out there who don’t know what the Slingbox is. (And by “some of you, I mean, “An Amish guy who is looking at this webpage on a laptop that fell off the back of a truck”.) It’s okay, I don’t judge: the Slingbox is a wonderful little device that takes whatever is on your tv and “slings” it to your laptop via the internet. It’s one of those pieces of technology that feels like it can’t possibly deliver what it promises — yeah, right, I’m sure it’ll only work if I’m plugged directly into a backbone router and no one else is using the internet that day — but that actually works in the real world on a regular basis.
For people that travel, the Slingbox is a must-have. All I need to do is connect to a hotel’s WiFi and the entire contents of my TiVo are there for me to look at. As an added bonus, whenever I start using it, my wife is convinced that a ghost suddenly decided to watch PTI, which makes for some hilarious panicked phone calls.
Since the unveiling of the iPhone app store, there has been rumors that the good people over at slingmedia would be releasing software that allows for use of the Slingbox for your iPhone. In fact, engadget.com had an article back in June that said that there’s a “proof of concept” for the software that is up and running. Well, it’s been three months … where the hell is my Slingbox for the iPhone?
I think every iPhone/Slingbox owner in America wants this software … so, what’s the hold-up? Some people have speculated that Apple itself doesn’t want the application; after all, the iPhone is, in part, an extension of the iTunes Media store. This is a store that wants to sell you television shows at $1.99 a pop. Maybe we haven’t seen a Slingbox application for the iPhone yet because Apple is worried that it’ll eat into its TV show sales.
Don’t be so naive. It’s the US government that doesn’t want the application! They know if you’re able to access your TiVo wherever there’s a WiFi hotspot via the big beautiful screen on your iPhone, the already struggling economy would fall into collapse. And worse, if Sling Media were to somehow figure a way to let us access our shows via the 3G network and make our TiVoed shows available anywhere in the civilized world, we might as well give up hope of ever being a productive country again. The government is trying once again to save us from ourselves.
Of course I’m only (kinda) joking. Whatever the hold-up, someone needs to jump into action soon and get this product out of the “proof-of-concept” phase and into the “on Jay Black’s iPhone” phase. If Steve Jobs is reading this (and why wouldn’t he be?), I urge you to make it happen, chop chop.
Clacked by Jay Black 
on Sep 22, 2008 @ 14:57 EST5EDT
Sign me up. Its one of those few mobile applications I wouldn’t mind paying for (I bougth the Palm client when I still had my Treo).