"One of the biggest issues I’ve noticed over the short time I’ve used Linux is that it [and the open source world in general] seems to lack a really excellent universal media player. I started this little, probably pointless, but fun project before discovering songbird, and built a demo of what I would consider the best media player. By the way, I don’t/ suck at programming, sorry. The first image below is just a plain sample, while the second is labeled to describe it further:

http://dagibit.googlepages.com/SongbirdPost.png
Using outstanding programs like Sony Vegas (which I have) as models, this media player would:
1. Be designed to perfectly support any media type and format from MPEGs, MP3s, and still images, to DVDs, panoramas, FLVs, and animated GIFs.
2. Have a simple and straightforward, but extremely powerful and customizable interface.
3. Replace all other media players for media on the desktop, and embedded on the web.
4. Can sync with Firefox or other browsers and detect playlists on the web (like songbird) and even intercept streams from other apps like Flash or Quicktime.
5. Be able to save any media it plays (ie streaming mov or flvs)
6. Not become confused or handicapped with certain media types or streaming situations.
7. Be entirely skinnable as well as in web player and fullscreen modes.
8. Have an excellent add-ons system like Firefox, possibly installed through Firefox via a Firefox add-on.
9. Have many other specific features not worth mentioning at the moment.
What do you think?"