Miro

It was once called "Democracy Player", but Miro seems to have a better ring to it. As a video player, Miro is a very intuitive piece of software that collects all your video files and places them in a navigation-friendly library. If you want to separate all that video into different playlists you've created, then it's as easy as dragging and dropping them wherever you want.

Because of its open-source architecture, Miro isn't constrained by anything limiting what kind of video codecs it can play. However, the one exception is for Mac users, who would have to download a codec called Flip4Mac in order to play Windows Media Video (WMV) files.

But even with all the video you own at your disposal, you have even greater access to a plethora of stuff directly from the Web. And best of all? The software and all its contents are free to download.

Plenty of Internet Channels
You might not know it, but there are a lot of video channels specifically created for Web viewers. Most of these are pretty specialized, like Classic Cartoons, LatinDanceTV and AnimeTV. But others are even more specific, like channels for Go Go dancers, stand-up comedians and fans of classic movies. Miro offers up a list of the most popular channels, but a search bar also gives you some leeway in finding whatever it is you're looking for, regardless of whether you're dead on or just looking for something within a certain genre.

Altogether, there are close to 5,000 channels currently available, and a majority of them offer a regular fix of video clips that can be fed to you through Real Simple Syndication (RSS). You can add as many as you want by simply clicking on the plus icon. Everything lines up for you on the lefthand side, much like playlists would in Apple's iTunes. When new video clips are downloaded, green circles with numbers show up next to each channel that has new content.

The beauty of all this is that you can keep what you want and then delete what you don't. You can even email a clip to a friend directly from Miro itself. Hey, even put one up on a forum, if you want!

Always remember though that video clips need to be downloaded onto your hard drive before you can view them. If you have dozens of channels feeding you content regularly, then you may find a good portion of your hard drive filled with all those clips.

Then again, it's unlikely that you would hold on to all those clips for too long. Much of the content available is really meant for limited consumption. Most clips are really just snippets — between two and 10 minutes — so you watch them and then discard them when you don't need them anymore.

But if you do want to archive any that stand out, then you could access them through the Miro folder (under "Movies" on the Mac, or "My Documents - My Videos" on the PC) and move them over to an external hard drive manually. Alternatively, if you have an external drive constantly hooked up to your home network or desktop computer, you can change Miro's settings so that clips automatically download to a different folder on that drive.

Easy to Use and Easy to Watch
All of this might seem a bit tough to grasp if you haven't really delved into Internet TV before, but it actually won't take long to get used to it. There's a section called "Using Miro" on the menu listing that offers up different tutorial video clips with step-by-step instructions on the different features you can access with the software.

It helps that once you've downloaded your regular string of content, you can always view it offline. This can be useful for travelers who stock up on a lengthy series of different clips for a longer trip on a plane, train or bus. Plus, you could always transfer some of the video over to portable media players like the iPod, Zen, Sansa or Zune.

Admittedly, channels vary on how often they put out new episodes, podcasts or snippets. Some could take weeks, while others could be multiple times a day. It really all depends on how specialized the channel is. News, sports and entertainment channels will probably feed you more than, say, a channel on stars and solar systems.

The image quality might not also be to your liking. You can watch it at full screen on your desktop or laptop, but the image might be grainy and pixilated in some cases. It's a two-edged sword, unfortunately. If files are too big, it could take a while for all of them to finally download fully. And since there's no way to view anything in Flash or some other streaming mode, you have to wait until the whole file has been downloaded.

But not everything is perfect, and Miro is no exception. It's got a few kinks that could be worked out, but as is, it's a pretty impressive piece of software and it's hard to beat the price. If you crave a healthy does of video, and you like keeping your video files neat and tidy, give this one a chance.