Toshiba Places is to go live in the UK in 2011, starting with the, as yet unannounced, SL and UL LED ranges.

You may remember Toshiba Places from when it was first announced at IFA back in September 2010, and subsequently hit French set-top boxes - but now the cloud-based web TV platform is all set to hit UK screens.

At a Toshiba showcase event on Tuesday, Pocket-lint was on hand to catch a glimpse of two of the sets it will début later on this year on - the SL and UL range - and also be shown a (albeit very French) demo by a Toshiba rep of Places in action.

The basic premise is much the same as we've come to expect from internet-enabled TVs, although Toshiba is very keen to stress that the action is entirely cloud based - no storage is needed and no software updates would be required and any app updates would appear automatically on the TVs UI.

There's also a nice social aspect to Toshiba Places, where you can hook up with your Toshiba-touting buddies to exchange photos, videos and messages through the portal, without having to worry about file sizes and storage as everything is cloud-based and streamed or shared via Toshiba's partners, such as Flickr and Daily Motion.

There's even room for multiple accounts, so you could have a different set of apps and media for your family - or you could even have a shared one of stuff you all enjoy watching together.

We were told that the launch would initially be on selected new TVs, but the idea was to extend the platform further down the line to Blu-ray players, dedicated boxes and even onto Toshiba's tablets.

No date was given as to when we can expect the Toshiba Places to land, the only info that was shared was that an announcement would come in the next few weeks - so stay tuned to Pocket-lint for updates.