Now I know the insta-response will be, No, of course not, there will always be Linux users and Myth enthusiasts. MythTV rocks. Knoppmyth rocks. Linux rocks. Vista sucks so bad. Besides, Myth backend server stuff -- no one beats that.
True. However, let's look at people. What made MythTV truly emergent? That is was free? Yup. Solid and packed with features? Yup. Worked on any old PC? Pretty much, within reason. An alternative to what? Nuthin'. That's hard to beat.
That was then.
We've seen many a promising open source Linux project turn esoteric hobby when (even expensive) propriety home-user packages came on stage. Final Cut Pro and Premiere trumped Avid by introducing NLE to the home user.... and so who uses Cinelerra today? I mean, for real? And for what?
Myth TV -- besides being *exclusively* full-featured and free -- just plain worked on slow machines thanks to the solidity and *low overhead* of Linux. It worked on your computer. A strong MythTV-like platform did not really exist for Macs or PCs, thus MythTV was the only good option for users willing to get just a little dirty. The other strong DVR systems were propriety pay / subscriber boxes like TIVO. In fact, just TIVO, period.
Then a couple of years went by.
Now, very recently to be sure, TV tuners are becoming standard pre-configured fare on consumer PC's, spurred in strong part by Microsoft's O.S. Media Player / TV PVR integration. This is quite new and popular. With the purchase of a new cheap Dell, for instance, you can have out-of-the-box free and full DVR functionality at no (visible -- and that's key) extra cost.
Though a lesser point, this doesn't help things: OpenGL / DirectX Linux equivalents are struggling at the same time that ATSC (digital high def television) quickly replaces analog these mere months, meaning that solid Linux solutions actually require MORE computing power than Windows machines for matching performance. For instance, if you have a Linux box that is even two years old, it may not be able to play OTA HDTV (unless, perhaps, you have the not-ready-for-primetime VDPAU working for you without complication). That, my friends, is a big change in terms of MythTV's original promise. Linus Turvalds made 'nix work on the everyman's kit car, the VW Bug of boxes, and became legend for it. Today -- as opposed to just last year -- to drive with Myth you must purchase an Acura. (An Acura off the lot happens to come pre-installed with Vista and Media Player 10.) Geez, sorry, enough with the awkward metaphors.
Look, I'm not saying that Media Player is in any way better than Myth -- obviously it's not -- any more than Premiere is (well, was) better than Cinelerra. We all know Vista sucks. I'm just looking at history. and well, human behavior here. I don't see how Myth can remain popular when it is no longer a) the exclusive answer b) the easier answer c) the clear features winner even against TIVO and now Media Player. It WILL remain relevant for a spate in terms of Linux preference / geekdom. But such a world, sans exclusive meeting of needs, is insular and always shrinks to legacy status over a few years time. Always.
Another hit. The emerging Mac/Windows solutions have by their very foundations easy-as-desktop integration with all internet client functionality. The once sensible appliance model may not be the most compatible with trends. In fact, in efforts to hamper open source, television networks now are streaming in protected codecs, meaning that web tv viewing on a Linux platform falls somewhere between cumbersome and impossible. (The most popular Myth appliance project still doesn't come with Firefox -- Firefox requires extra setup. Even so, Firefox on Linux does not conveniently handle the likes of tv network webcasting. Mythweb can't do YouTube or Hulu, and MythTV plugins don't do YouTube well, or Hulu at all.)
I think taking a look around should motivate some evaluation of the near-term shape and goals of MythTV and the appliance projects. I want to see Myth still be dominant twenty-four months from now, but don't see how that can be the way things are going. It's time for a little new thought, not just momentum. My .02.