Google TV - Your television with a keyboard

At their annual Google I/O conference, Google announced yesterday their new TV software called GoogleTV. The new product is designed to integrate your television with the Web in such a way that you can easily search for programs (using Google search, of course) and view them on the air, on your integrated DVR, or on the web (at Google-owned YouTube, of course). The new system will be available integrated into televisions or as stand-alone boxes.

The new devices will require a keyboard for input, raising the question, "If you're going to need a keyboard to interact with your television anyway, why not just hook up a cheap computer instead?" It will be interesting to see if it catches on, or is relegated to a "hobby" like Apple's AppleTV device.