Gizmodo: wii internet channel

Nintendo Stops Charging for the Wii's Browser, Emulates an Apology

John Herrman — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 13:20:00 EDT

You know what was dumb, until just now? That you had to pay, at least in Wii Points, to download the console's Opera browser, which isn't very good. Today, Nintendo would like to let you know that they're (somewhat) sorry!

The deal, according to ElectricPig, is as follows: If you never dropped those 500 Wii Points on access to the Internet Channel, you can now download it for free. If you for whatever reason had, you're entitled to free access to "a Virtual Console NES title worth 500 points," which, despite the vague phraseology, is pegged with an October release date. In other words, it's a specific game, instead of a simple 500-point credit, or at least a range of titles.

To be fair, they didn't have to give users anything, and no matter how marginally useful the browser is, whenever it was free—like at launch—it felt like a nice value add. [ElectricPig via Kotaku]

Wii Internet Channel Exploit Found, Homebrew to Come?

Jason Chen — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 14:20:05 EDT

We don't have a lot of details, but some "hackers" have found an exploit in the Wii Internet Channel's Flash player implementation. What does this mean to you? Well, if they take this exploit all the way to the end, it means you can possibly run unsigned, home-brew code on the Wii.

Whether this means Wii games or retro games, or possibly both, is still uncertain. But if hackers create game emulators, such as NES, SNES or MAME, there'd be no reason for gamers to pay $5 each for virtual console games when they can just download a ROM and play the game in its original glory. [Computer and Video Games via T3]

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Wii Internet Channel Goes Live

Louis Ramirez — Fri, 22 Dec 2006 08:46:02 EST

We knew it was coming. As of this morning, all you lucky Wii owners will be able to connect to the Internet using your Wii's Opera-based browser. The final version of the browser will be available in March and you'll have till June to download it, otherwise you'll have to pony up 500 points for it. But starting today, you can enjoy all the surfing you want. And yes, that means you can now play your favorite YouTube videos on the big screen. – Louis Ramirez

Product Page [Wii Internet Channel Live in North America via Kotaku]