One of the projects I mentioned in one of my workshops at the NZ National Digital Forum was Boxee. I was alerted to Boxee by Shannon O’Neill only a night or two ago via his RSS.
Boxee is a good example of the important social side of media use and consumption. It is also a good example of connected media.
At the base level your media files are indexed and connected to their cover art, lyrics, reviews and other metadata from across the web. More importantly, though, the service enables the social element of synchronous watching/listening with your friends. You can alert you friends when you are watching or listening to something, and you can simultaneously watch/listen with your friends.
This ‘sociality’ gets to the core of what media is about – it is about content and the social relationships and meanings that form around that content.
Take a quick look at their promotional video –