Ive been demo'ing one for our company and have tried it with the empeg.
The slimp3 will do streaming so I took a copy of the URL's from hijack and put these into a playlist file on a PC for streaming from.
Ok, not exactly what you are after but it looked pretty kool to the person I was showing (off) to.

Ive been wondering about the perl thing myself. It seems that it uses limited functions but you are still going to have to run a hefty bit of code. I dont know enough about the empeg kernel to comment with any knowledge on this.

As for the slimp3, yeah, Id buy one, but it is expensive for what it is. Im getting well into to home automation and have looked at another product called the exstreamer which is much the same but without the screen. I dont need a screen when controlling from a PC or web tablet.

The slimp3 in the UK is priced way too high at £240, its $240 in the US, gotta love that 1:1 exchange rate! For that money I could put together an itx box with vfd screen, and stream to that with the same software. IMHO the software isnt killer like the empeg, tho better interfaces are under development.

If you do get one, make sure it comes with the newer custom slimp3 remote control, the older units shipped with a universal sony one.