Hypervisor and webtop in a set top box environment

1 . An instant-on environment for a set top box, comprising:

a hypervisor instantiated by a BIOS associated with at least one processor;

at least one application space instantiated by said hypervisor in parallel to, and prior to complete boot of, at least one set top box operating system; and

a graphical user interface comprising at least one application software, which at least one application software comprises at least one received content and at least one embedded content, launched within said at least one application space;

wherein the at least one received content is accessed by said hypervisor after instantiation.

2 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein the received content is delivered based on user attributes.

3 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein the received content is information regarding one selected from the group consisting of available on-demand content, locally available content, present viewing availability, and future viewing availability.

4 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein said graphical user interface comprises a webtop.

5 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein the at least one embedded content comprises at least one widget.

6 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein said hypervisor directs a networked communication for the BIOS.

7 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein the at least one embedded content comprises an advertisement.

8 . The instant-on environment of claim 7 , wherein the advertisement comprises at least one selected from the group consisting of a banner ad, a text ad and a popup ad.

9 . The instant-on environment of claim 7 , wherein the advertisement comprises a targeting to an active user of said graphical user interface.

10 . The instant-on environment of claim 9 , wherein the targeting comprises at least one cookie obtained by said graphical user interface.

11 . The instant-on environment of claim 9 , wherein the targeting comprises at least one cookie obtained by the operating system.

12 . The instant-on environment of claim 7 , wherein the at least one advertisement comprises a widget.

13 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein the at least one embedded content comprises a network search capability.

14 . The instant-on environment of claim 13 , wherein the network search capability is associated with a sponsor.

15 . The instant-on environment of claim 13 , wherein the network search capability presents at least one networked advertisement in association with a search result.

16 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein the at least one application software comprises virtual ware.

17 . The instant-on environment of claim 16 , wherein the virtual ware comprises a remote server access provided by the BIOS via an executed network link.

18 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , wherein said graphical user interface comprises virtual ware.

19 . The instant-on environment of claim 18 , wherein the virtual ware comprises a webtop, and wherein the webtop comprises a remote drag-and-drop content functionality with at least one environment native to the BIOS.

20 . The instant-on environment of claim 18 , wherein the virtual ware comprises a webtop, and wherein the webtop provides web-based centralized storage.

21 . The instant-on environment of claim 18 , wherein the webtop provides access to at least one on-line store.

22 . The instant-on environment of claim 1 , further comprising a overlay engine, wherein said overlay engine overlays said graphical user interface and the set top box tuner upon a user instruction.