Print Apple's latest Apple TV set-top box is not just a device for streaming movies and television shows, it's also a device that hackers and jailbreakers love to tinker with. Wired's Brian X. Chen reports that the recent release of the second-generation Apple TV has revitalized the idea of popping open the device, both literally and figuratively.
Developers are currently working on projects that will do things like put the Boxee TV platform on the proprietary device, and a "patch stick" that would have installation software to break through the Apple TV's stock software. In addition, modders are working on a way to get the original Apple TV apps hacked into from your main computer. Even the Cydia app store is working on ways to being their coveted jailbroken apps to the Apple TV. The device is cheap enough that this is all possible, and it helps that most of the developers chipping away at the device as also developing apps in the App Store. 
"The old Apple TV is kinda sputtering and dying because it’s a 4-year-old product. Now you have all the people who have done amazing stuff on the iPhone working with us, and it’s made our jobs for the Apple TV a thousand times easier," says Kevin Bradley, an Apple TV programmer. "…I think some really amazing things could come out of this.”
Apple TV hacking veteran Jim Dovey adds that he's working on a software development kit for testing apps for the Apple TV, especially ones like AirPlay."I’d be very interested in the possibilities of using AirPlay video to treat an AppleTV as an attached screen in my iPhone, iPad or even Mac apps," Dovey says in the article.
So, what do you think? Would you like to hack your own apps for the Apple TV? What are ones that you love on the iPhone and iPad that you'd love to see on your tiny set-top box device?
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