As we saw at CES 2010, IPTV is going to become real in a very big way this year. Boxee has been one of the big players in this space for quite some time and today the company is announcing a move that will offer users and content partners more options and flexibility: Boxee Payments. Boxee plans on releasing a Payment Platform this summer so that users can make purchases with one click of the remote. This will allow content partners to offer shows, movies and channels that were previously unavailable on Boxee. Partners can price and package content however they want, whether it's pay-per-view or subscription.

The details are still being worked out, but Boxee will charge a small fee for the transactions (the plan is to charge less than the 30% that many other app stores and content ecosystems charge). By doing this, Boxee is, in their words, "[tying] our success as a business to the success of our partners."

Having micro-payments built into Boxee has huge implications for the platform as a whole. Right now, the only downside of a system like Boxee is that although more and more partners are signing up to offer content through the service or offer an enhanced experience, when it comes to getting movies or TV shows that are accessible through platforms like iTunes or VUDU or CinemaNow, users are out of luck. This gives Boxee as a platform the opportunity to offer those enhanced options.

I've long wanted to see one of my favorite streaming content services The Auteurs on Boxee, because it's really just a beautiful fit. The Auteurs streams premium film content from partners like The Criterion Collection to users at an affordable price. With a Payment Platform, stuff like The Auteurs could be accessible on your Boxee Box or HTPC, as well as on your laptop or desktop computer.

Make no mistake, subscription content plans that are aimed at IPTVs are coming. Apple might not have hit Apple TV out of the park, but the idea of being able to buy or rent content on your TV that you can also watch on your Mac or PC (or even iPhone or iPod) is compelling. Boxee is legitimizing itself in a sense by making it clear that it wants to play in this space.

The convergence of media options is upon us, and it will be fascinating to see how content providers, content platforms and consumers respond and react to these changes.