My initial answer was one - of course - but then I realized that it is not that easy to answer. One video player is enough to play most videos on my computer, I use SMPlayer for this purpose. But what about all those video portals from tv companies or other companies that rent or distribute videos online ? It is beginning to get a little messy now.

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NBC offers two official ways to watch their tv shows online. The first is NBC Direct which forces uses to download and install DRM infested software that adds the permanent MediaAgent.exe process to your system wasting resources even though the NBC Direct client is not running.

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NBC Direct is a software that will be installed on your computer if you want to watch the videos offered at the NBC Direct website. Before NBC Direct is installed the Open Case Media Agent is installed on your system as well which is used for distributing content and managing rights.

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I spotted a huge process in my task manager today called MediaAgent.exe which used roughly 30 Megabytes of RAM. A quick check revealed that the process belonged to a OpenCASE Media Agent which I was not aware to have installed after all. My first fears that it was some sort of trojan, virus or spyware that managed to sneak into my system thankfully did not turn out to be true.

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I’m a bit puzzled by the recent launch of NBC’s Direct, a video downloads website just a few weeks after launching Hulu together with News Corp. Direct Video Downloads sound nice at first glance which is exactly what users would like. Instead of watching the tv episodes at Hulu online they can now download the videos and watch them whenever they feel fit to do it.

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