Mainely Entertainments

We're always looking for ways to entertain ourselves during the long Maine winter. When the weather allows there are York High School B-ball games and UNH Hockey games. When the weather doesn't cooperate we've turned to Wii, American Idol, LOST, and books from Amazon.com. Now there's a totally new way to spend money and give us more reason to lay on the couch in front of the fireplace. Unbox:

Amazon.com, the online retail giant, and TiVo, pioneer of the digital video recorder, are teaming up to help downloaded movies and TV shows make the leap to television screens.

In a deal to be announced Wednesday, Amazon and TiVo will allow TiVo owners who shop on Amazon’s digital download store, called Amazon Unbox, to send films and TV shows to their broadband-connected TiVo machines, and pause and fast-forward through them as they do a regular TV program.

The partnership gives Amazon an advantage over other download services like the iTunes Store, CinemaNow and a new service from Wal-Mart. Moving video files purchased on those sites from the PC to the television is tricky, generally requiring the setup of a home network.

If you want to be notified when the service is ready for primetime, sign up at TiVo.com.