Mainstream consumer solutions for browsing the web on your television have existed since the 1996 launch of WebTV. And the hardware necessary for watching (and recording) TV programming on a personal computer existed for more than a decade before Hulu brought Simpsons episodes and SNL Digital Shorts to our desktops legally. But despite the recent growth in sales of devices like Apple TV, mainstream adoption of convergent solutions has been slow to take off.

This may be about to change, with a surprising player in the media convergence environment: gaming consoles.

In the UK and Ireland, Xbox Live members will soon be able to watch premium content and live television from Sky TV straight from a Xbox 360 via a broadband connection. (Watching live television on your TV doesn’t exactly sound revolutionary, but stop and think about how much that premium-cable-plus-DVR package is costing you versus your $20/mo broadband connection.) Integration with Hulu may soon follow.

(image via Gizmodo)

Why is the Xbox 360 the right platform for this convergence? For starters, they combine the hardware of multiple devices in one: the standard 120GB hard drive could replace the need for a separate TiVo/DVR, and deals with Netflix and other media partners make standalone devices such as Apple TV unnecessary.

But most significantly, the Xbox 360 already has a huge user base. More than 28 million units have been sold since the console’s launch. And even more significantly, more than 17 million of those users are Xbox Live subscribers, meaning that well over half of these consoles are already hooked up to a broadband connection. The potential of this platform as a consumer media solution was proven when over 1 million copies of the Netflix application for Xbox were downloaded and installed in the first three months of its release.

While newcomer Boxee represents a huge leap in web and TV convergence, boasting social networking and media services like Last.fm and Pandora in addition to streaming television programming, its adoption may be hampered by the fact that it is just one more device to sit under your TV. Recall that Betamax was a better quality video solution, but VHS took an early lead in market share and never looked back. With a three-year lead in retail availability, the it is doubtful that the 360 will see serious competition from Boxee. And the 360 is keeping up on social features as well, adding Facebook Connect and Twitter integration in the near future.

Of course, no one is buying an Xbox 360 purely for its media capabilities — yet. Keep in mind that for a time, the Playstation 3 was also the cheapest Blu-ray player on the market, making it a completely respectable home-theater purchase even for someone with no interest in ever playing a video game. It would not be a surprise to see Microsoft continue to evolve the Xbox 360 platform with additional partnerships and further software improvements geared towards transitioning the console into the role of an “all-you-need-is-one-box” consumer media hub.

This post originally published at scheuguy.com.