Successful since it started a few years ago, The Metropolitan Opera is coming back with the fourth season of its The Met: Live in HD series. Starting October 10, this year's series expands to "nearly 500" theaters across the U.S. experiencing live and prerecorded high definition feeds several days a week. We'll probably just check out Aida via the streaming player at home , but for the full experience, hit the read link to find out where it's showing near you.

We knew good and well that the fine folks over at MediaMall were toiling away in an attempt to bring internet TV content from YouTube, Hulu, Netflix, CBS, CNN and a host of other sources to Nintendo's white-hot Wii, but there's just nothing like hearing that intentions have become reality. Based on an email from MediaMall support to a particularly curious user, the "latest version of PlayOn includes a beta version of Wii functionality in it." Naturally, the company's doing its darnedest to keep this under wraps for now, but we're eager to get legions of Wii users testing it out and reporting back with performance evaluations. The note does mention that quality will be lower than on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 due to the inherit hardware limitations on Nintendo's baby, but hey, you knew that going in, right? Hop on past the break for the letter in its entirety, which includes instructions on getting this going on your console.

[Thanks, Anonymous]

Know an opera fan that hasn't been willing to drop the cash on a subscription or per episode fee for the Met Player streaming experience? All this weekend until midnight Sunday they're offering free and unlimited access to 200 full length operas, including 20 from the first three seasons of the Live in HD series. English subtitles are available for all of them, plus recently added French, German and Spanish subtitles. From "available only in select markets" to free streaming in HD to your computer in just a couple of years, wonder what they'll think of next?

One look at the Caruso speakers from Opera Loudspeakers and you know the punchline -- sure they're fat, but will they sing? Details on what's packed in each handcrafted box is suitably sparse, as these are clearly intended for the silly-rich who want something that's expensive, showy and fits in well with the decor of the prospective owner's abode -- something keeps pulling us towards a Fifth Element Mondoshawan theme (we'll let you judge if that's good or bad). Caruso praised the four side mounted 8-inch woofers, and based on the pics, we're guessing that after that there are four 5-inch mids and five 2-inch tweets (four rearward facing). Lots of cabinetry, lots of wood and lots of money; can you say "ostentatious flagship?" Paired up with the Caruso name, the €28,000 ($35,000) sticker brings Pagliacci to our minds.

[Mondoshawan image courtesy Gung Ho Sci Fi]

You just know that if times are tough for consumer electronics, they're really bleak for public schools. With that in mind, we're calling out the bright spot that is The Metropolitan Opera's "HD Live in Schools" program that since January 10th has been making its movie theater productions (in HD, naturally) of Met performances free to students, parents and teachers across 18 schools in 13 states. Better still, The Met plans on expanding the program to 180 schools across the US. Now we know that it's not every K-12 schooler that will appreciate opera, but the opportunity to take in some premium HD content for free is pretty sweet if you ask us; any students that get turned on to HD, opera or music in general are bonus. If nothing else, this has got to beat writing a report on what makes the A-B-B-A song form so darn catchy, right?

It's opera season once more, and this time we've got Italy's own SIM2 getting involved. The company famous for engineering remarkably sexy (and incredibly expensive) projectors has just announced that its DLP-based PRO5DL flagship Digital Cinema projector will be used to show audiences in LA and NYC live broadcasts of the La Scala Opera season. The transmissions will be beamed from the La Scala Operahouse in Milan to the Beverly Hills Laemmle Theater and Miller Theater at Columbia University in New York, and the images will be displayed on 28-foot wide screens. We're not sure how costly a ticket is, but it's sure to be substantially lower than a round trip ticket to Italy.

The New York Times got an early peek at the Metropolitan Opera's new HD video on-demand streaming website, set to launch October 22, and came away with a few complaints. While the sound was described as clear and rich, accompanying sharp video, browser glitches and the need to download an add-on for the Move Networks based player made for a clumsy experience. If a $15 subscription month long subscription is too much, individual operas are available for $3.99 to $4.99 with 13 high definition performances available initially. Being this close to the launch makes us think back 125 years ago when you had to actually go to the Met to see an Opera or the old days of 2007, when you had to put on pants and leave the house to get a high definition show. The future, is now.

Let's say you're interested in checking out a HD performance of the Metropolitan Opera, but the idea of getting your entertainment on someone else's schedule doesn't agree with your PVR-placeshifted-virtual community sensibilities. No problem -- beginning on October 22, the Met is bringing 170 performances -- 120 audio-only, 50 with video -- including recent HD simulcast shows (promised to be in web-quality HD) to your browser. This will be a subscription service, to the tune of $15 per month, or $150 for the whole year. Having to install a dedicated Move Networks player to keep everything on the up-and-up is a niggle, but if there aren't participating theaters or PBS affiliates in your area, it's worth checking out.

[Via press]

We suspect that there aren't many occasions at the Metropolitan Opera that call for the term "hat trick," but the Met is kicking off its third season of simulcasting performances in HD this Monday. It's been a great ride for the Met: seasons one and two saw the audience swell from 325,000 to 935,000, with distribution increasing from seven to 17 countries. And season three has no plans on slowing down -- with almost the full Met season in the lineup, projections are set for 1.2 million viewers in 30 countries across 850 movie theaters. With the uneasy economic times here in the US, this is a great way to check out first rate performances with picture and sound quality to match without breaking the bank, so keep your eyes open.

Poised to take advantage of the dearth of classical music television stations in the U.S., Unitel Classica is planning a worldwide classical channel formatted for HDTV. The German production company already supplies HD concerts via satellite in Europe on SES Astra, and the Classica standard definition opera and classical channel in several countries. The new channel will launch in Germany first in the fourth quarter, before potentially making the jump over here. With that much experience behind them, and the enthusiastic response to opera and classical broadcasts already available, Unitel should be ready to give the classical fans what they've been waiting for sometime in 2009.

Apparently the Met isn't the only one focused on spoiling opera viewers remotely, broadcast company Arqiva is delivering live HD feeds of opera from Italy and Spain via its satellite network. Working with DDCinema, it delivered its last broadcast of Samson and Delilah from the Teatro Comunale in Bologna, Italy to nearly 70 theaters across Europe. If any of Engadget HD's European opera fans missed out, don't worry, they plan at least three more tests this year. As long as they don't try to skimp on the HD and Dolby 5.1 Surround audio, we expect the results will be just fine.

In the same way that HD has spoiled sports and nature fans with its eye-popping visuals, it has expanded its domain to the opera world. According to the NY Times, the Met's eight broadcasts last season pulled in 908,000 viewers. Further, the number of people who took in these broadcast performances outnumbered the Metropolitan Opera House attendees by 58,000 over the same time period. These are great numbers for the highbrow fare, but what's really telling is the comparative turnout netted by the lower quality broadcast used by the San Francisco Opera. The author of the linked article reports the San Francisco Opera's efforts have enjoyed much less success, and points to a turnout of four at the local screening of "Madama Butterfly" as evidence. Broadcast opera seems like it's here to stay, and HD looks to be a component crucial to success. Bravo!

If you think it's tough sticking to an exclusive diet of HD content, try being a fan of opera (the genre, not the browser, silly). Not many towns can even consider supporting an opera company, and scheduling and pricing cuts out another swath of interested folks in markets that do have an opera company. The Metropolitan Opera company has enjoyed success showing HD productions of its performances in theaters worldwide, and is now branching out to even more markets with PBS. The performances will appear underneath the "Great Performances" banner, so check your local listings if you're interested. We promise we won't tell your sports-fanatic crew you broke out the wine and cheese and peeped some opera!

Everyone with a projection system knows it all too well -- your bulb will choose to make its exit from the world of functional gadgets when you have a bunch of friends over to show off your HD rig. Take heart, it happens to the best of them: the second season premiere of The Metropolitan Opera's "Live in HD" in West Des Moines was struck down by Murphy's Law this past weekend. Part way through the showing of "Romeo et Juliet" a bulb burned out on the star-crossed lovers, leaving only the soundtrack (accompanied by a grumbling audience). Luckily, the broadcast was being taped, so the theater was able to show the production in its entirety after the bulb was replaced. Word to the wise -- keep a spare bulb handy for mission critical viewing!