TiVo Will Die 402
Espectr0 writes "Yahoo! News has a PC Magazine-reprinted story about why they think the TiVo will die because of rising competition. From the article: 'It's always hard to write an obituary, especially when the subject is still alive. It's especially hard for me, because I love the little guy like a brother. But, alas, TiVo will die. I was one of the first reviewers to get my hands on an early TiVo box. I compared TiVo with ReplayTV, and although I really wanted to like ReplayTV, TiVo won my heart over.'"
first apple, (Score:2, Insightful)
Tivo isn't ready to die yet (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, if you are talking about stand-alone Tivo units, yeah they will probably go away, but I am willing to accept that to have one component on my AV rack instead of two.
I agree (Score:2, Insightful)
Computer geeks vs. indie music geeks (Score:5, Insightful)
Indie music geeks have attained the level of zen ennui where they deem bands passe before the last flyer reading "2 GUITARISTS SEEK DRUMMER" is done printing at Kinko's.
Now computer geeks are achieving the same thing by declaring every new technology dead before it's even managed to hit its stride. It does not make you a geekier person, or a better one, or a smarter one, to say this crap.
TiVo won't die (Score:5, Insightful)
But that's ok.
Consider the home PVR market. By all accounts, it's a growing market. In years to come, let's say that it's a $10B market. Even with just 10% market share, that's $1B. Not chump change.
Honestly it's like saying AOL will die. Fading into obscurity, being obsolete, etc are not equivalent to dying. Last time I checked [com.com], AOL still had 24.3 million subscribers. All joking aside, let's assume 20m actually pay. That is still $400m/MONTH which is a CASH stream that I dare not to cough at.
Death of Tivo (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Sheesh! (Score:5, Insightful)
Wannabe pundits don't get ad dollars or further writing assignments by getting the facts straight and admitting they cannot see the future, they get attention by taking a few small things, extrapolating them into way farther into the future than makes any sense at all, and having people on slashdot and their sites' message boards argue about it.
How can it die when Tivo is now a verb? (Score:5, Insightful)
With that sort of name recognition, they're not going away any time soon. They may get bought, but the name will be around for quite some time.
Moore's law no excuse... (Score:2, Insightful)
PC Magazine reports non-PC product will die (Score:5, Insightful)
Moore's Law - Just because you can put an MPEG2 stream onto a hard drive without converting to analog, doesn't mean a TiVo isn't a better way to do it than a clunky piece of crap set-top box from your local spam^H^H^H^Hcable company. TiVo wins marketshare because of its UI, not because it's doing anything technologically revolutionary. Moore's law merely means that the cost of silicon will continue to drop -- but the cost of building a TiVo is about the same as the cost of building anything else. TiVo's strength - its usability - is a function of good design, not the cost of silicon.
HDTV - And next week, IPv6 to take over the world! Enough said.
Murdoch / DirecTV - Then he'll buy TiVo outright, which will also be good for TiVo. Why oust it in favor of something less useful but cheaper, when Moore's Law says both the clunky and the useful products are going to be the same price?
The article's an unwarranted slam against TiVo and only towards the end do we find the real motivation:
So that's the real reason for this poorly-thought-out slam: The author used to get serviced to orgasm from the company whenever he flashed his press credentials. But today, he gets the same customer service as the rest of us get... from every company we do business with. It's phone support. It's going to suck Deal with it.
What's next? Netcraft author denied photo-op with cute daemon-suited ch1x0rz at LinuxWorld, and writes a report that confirms FreeBSD is dying?
Re:Sheesh! (Score:5, Insightful)
Apparently since the 16th century [nostradamus.org].
Tivo's service will die (Score:3, Insightful)
Then, they will have a simple box to type ANY phone number or IP Address (if a network interface is present) to download from, and cable/satellite providers will give you free access to a scheduling server of some sort, and there will be a standard for these schedules.
Not everyone makes/desires a home-brew alternative (Score:5, Insightful)
When normal people want toast, they buy a toaster. They don't take a previously-existing, alternate kitchen appliance, tear it open, and make it capable of producing toast.
The key to making a name for TiVo was impressing the geeks, as they were most likely to be the early adopters. The key to selling TiVo is to convince the regular people that it's easy-to-use, provides a valuable service, and that it's priced within reason. Seeing as every person I know who has used my TiVo for a few minutes has purchased one, geek or not, I believe it has adequately met those criteria.
Re:Too expensive... (Score:5, Insightful)
The current model has got to go. Let's see, you buy the locked-down box for the full price ($150 - $300+) and then have to pay obscene amounts of money ($12 a month?) for the privilege to download the TV program schedule (which programs like MythTV do for free). I call that a ripoff, and that's why Tivo is hardly selling any standalone units.
Also, many people have digital cable and so on, and you can't really use a PVR with it unless you pay extra for multiple cable boxes (and somehow interface the cable box to the tivo). The way I see it, Tivo can survive only by licensing its stuff to cable/satellite box manufacturers. And I'm sure they would much rather do it in-house to save money. So I definitely think the article has a point.
Patents? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Sheesh! (Score:2, Insightful)
Tivo is utterly doomed. their only chance is to sell-out to the sattelite companies and become integrated into all sattelite boxes.
The cable companies see that they can eliminate the worthless expense that is Nielsen ratings if they can collect the data in real time from their subscribers... thus putting a huge expense out of the bottom line while generating a gigantic revenue stream because of the targeted advertising the boxes allow to happen..
Sorry, Tivo's headstone was being carved 2 years ago at NAB when i saw the motorola PVR digital boxes that were to roll out.
Re:Too expensive... (Score:1, Insightful)
Does the old unit need to be broken, or can I transfer to upgrade?
As it stands now, I am considering moving to the Dish Network, Voom, or Cable if I can't xfer my subscription.
Don't paint us all with the same brush. (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember, the "Death of Apple" has been predicted for so long that it's become a standard joke, so I hardly think it counts. If nothing else. Microsoft has a vested interest in Apple staying alive. They need competitors to fend off the world's Monopoly laws, and Apple is a better competitor to have than Linux. Why? Because Apple isn't trying to take over the world and doesn't have masses of developers and users out for blood. Apple has a bottom line to worry about, and while Linux companies have to worry about money, Linux itself does not.
Computer journalists love to predict the impending death of a technology, because it gets more readers. It's more sensational to say something is dying than to say it is facing challenges from a shifting market.
The only person who speaks for me is me, and I haven't heard or read all that many people predicting the death of technology.
Besides, the articles listed today are hardly "New technology" whose death is being predicted "before it's even managed to hit its stride." Both Apple and TiVo have been around the block and had high points as well as low.
As a side note, I'd like to caution everyone against confusing being critical of a new technology with predicting it's death. Lots of new technologies are being awaited with baited breath, and others are declared DOA because they're either obvious vapor ware like the Phantom Game Consol, not mature enough to take to market just yet (Nintendo Virtual Boy) or a technology looking for a market (Remember those Smell Cards they were developing?)
Re:TiVo won't die (Score:1, Insightful)
He's saying that with Motorola and Scientific Atlanta building cable STBs with PVRs built in, and Dish building it's own PVR, and DirecTV maybe deciding the Tivo software is too expensive, Tivo will not be a presence in the digital TV STB market. He further asserts that if you're getting digital TV, it's easier (one box, not two) and better (video quality wise) to get the PVR built into the STB for that service.
He then asserts that TV is at an inflection point and that digital TV is about to rapidly take over from analog.
At that point, Tivo is left with the analog TV market and that isn't enough to sustain them. They will slowly wither and die. Their only hope is to license the software to Dish, SA, and Motorola, like they did with DirecTV.
One might disagree with the timeframe for the analog/digital transition, but I can't see how any of the above are wrong. People don't buy Tivos because they (a) don't understand and (b) don't want to hassle with setting it up. It's also (c) too expensive for some. I don't think a nicer GUI is going to overcome the hurdles.
Putting the PVR in the STB fixes (b) and (c) (with way better video quality to boot) and (a) isn't too hard if Comcast/Dish/Time-Warner/DirecTV keeps blasting you with fliers about it.
Hes right, unless Tivo Changes (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Sheesh! (Score:3, Insightful)
people also love to make predicitons, and we love to be right, no matter what it's about. which is why the the stock market and gambling in general are so popular.
therefore, people REALLY like to make predictions about death/the end/destruction of people/careers/projects/companies.
Re:Sheesh! (Score:3, Insightful)
So they can sell the "next big thing" during the xmas season. Trash your VCR, your tivo, and buy our lastest contraption.
Re:Tivo Should DIE (Score:4, Insightful)
Next time, check your facts before posting.
-jason
Re:Sheesh! (Score:3, Insightful)
Tivo is easier to use than any other PVR I've ever used. Tivo lets you record 2 shows at once, and has season passes. Comcast doesn't. It is $4.99/month, only slighty more than the $3.50/month you say Comcast charges, and is free if you get DirecTV's full programming package.
Maybe Tivo will die, maybe it won't, I dunno. But Tivo's death has been predicted about as often as Usenet's.
Re:What is ZD's Accuracy? (Score:2, Insightful)
Cable and satellite are pushing HDTV hard. Regular non-techie folks are all abuzz about how good the superbowl looked on their friends new HDTV plasma.
This wont be the year that HDTV becomes ubiquitous, but it's going to grow more this year than it has in the last decade.
I'd compare it to color tv.. Black and white sets hung around for decades.. Things move faster now, prices drop faster, but it'll be the same way.
Logical fallacy (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:day of idiotic faux tech news... (Score:3, Insightful)
This is rapidly changing. Here in Southern California, ALL of the cable companies are offering a dominately digital service for under $40, and a rapidly uptaking channels from their analog system into their digital one. My local cable company, for example, offers a digital tier that is exactly the same price as the 51-channel "analog" service. You cannot even find the analog service in their promotion: if you were to call and order "cable", you'd get a digital-tier package with digital set-top boxes.
His point is valid, and his point is that TiVo is reacting slowly to market force changes. Here in SoCal, Adelphia and Time-Warner have been aggessively marketing their digital tier packages, and Time Warner has been adding the 1-2 punch of their sub-$10 PVR service and programming on demand. Why would I buy a TiVo now if I could get a PVR from my cable company for less than TiVo's monthly service?
Plus, Time Warner offers a service that TiVo dosen't: programming on demand. At the moment, the offerings are trim, but on their premium digital tier you can get popular programming ON DEMAND. If I hear from a friend that tonight's CSI episode was really cool, and I don't typically watch CSI, I can still get it via Time-Warner's programming on demand service after the fact.
That is exactly his point. The CONVERGENCE of cable set-top box, broadband digital cable, and PVR is going to be what kills TiVo. TiVo was an awesome first-generation product.. but the next-generation PVR will likely just be local storage of streamed content via broadband cable. And, since TiVo's arrogance locked them out of the cable market, they'll forever now be behind.
The author also failed to mention that the chairman of TiVo also sits on the board of directors at NetFlix. Imagine the possibilities there.
Sure, that's great. But, where I live, my cable company is Time-Warner. My local cable company dosen't just share a single board member with a large media producer: they are part of the same company. That has real possibility: they own the pipe, they own a piece of the content on the pipe, and they own one of the production companies producing the content on the pipe. Netflix is a red herring: who needs to ship out discs to your customers when you have a nice fat pipe between you and them that you control? Netflix is also increasingly getting competition, and it will be interesting to see five years from now where they stand, especially with Wal-Mart getting in the "mailing discs rental" business.
Again, it's about CONVERGENCE. Whoever has the most bits of the pie will likely be the winner. And, at the moment, the cable companies have the most bits, with the Dishers a close second. That makes it look like DIRECTV would be TiVo's saving grace, but as he pointed out, that's unlikely given their corporate style.
This dosen't even touch upon regulatory issues, like HDTV's "broadcast" flag, and the recent FCC proposal that may result in VHF TV disappearing from many markets in 2006.
It'll be fun to watch, but I will be surprised if TiVo is a big player in a few years.
Re:Sheesh! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sheesh! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Too expensive... (Score:3, Insightful)
You hack into it...clone the original drive onto a larger HD...then, just keep replacing the drive over the years as needed. The HD, I'm guessing, would be your greatest point of failure since it is running all the time. So,if you do this...you could keep your original Tivo going for a long, long, long time...
At least, that's my plan!
Re:Sheesh! (Score:3, Insightful)
TW
No clue about business (Score:2, Insightful)
TIVO is in a favourable position. They have a lot of know how (also in the way of providing services, which is important), their brand is strong (almost used as synonym for PVR) and may have asignificantinstalled base (not sure about this). As every start-up pioneering a new market they have now to keep up with the fact that there will be competition from established players, change in distribution models etc. That's quite normal, it's a challenge. But it's by no means a sure death. (Of course, it might be more profitable to sell to another player, but this is not a death!)
But sure, I bet many people were convinced of "Microsoft will die because IBM is going to do PC operating systems now (OS2)" too.
Old technologies don't die, they stop (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Where patent law is good (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Now that's crazy talk! (Score:3, Insightful)
If your entire argument that Tivo is in fine shape because of its partnership with DirecTV, then Tivo is NOT in good shape.
Poor Journalism and not even insightful (Score:2, Insightful)