Can TiVo be Saved? 604
ChipGuy writes "TiVo's death watch has begun. The company is having a tough time finding traction in the marketplace, as more and more competitors rush into the market, most of them deep pocketed satellite and cable companies. But is all lost? What if the company went private and became the anti-cable, letting us download, store, organize, and serve media from both cable and -- this is the important part -- the internet.
Others believe that TiVo should get into the content aggregation business."
don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Insightful)
I figure that the Cable companies are going to move very quickly in this arena. My own (Comcast) offers "On Demand" programming right now for free. I can view programs, store and play later as if it were a movie/DVD. It sounds like the next step is to watch what ever you want, when you want as long as you pay what they want.
I can wait for it all to come together, I know how to program my VCR.
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:3, Interesting)
Also, what could be done is each device that gets a title registers with the seeder, and it will DL/UL titles via swarming (Bittorrent) from the other devices that have/want the same titles.
Securing the network can be tricky, sure - but that part ill leave to tivo/netflix/hackers.
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5915470/site/newswe
-9mm-
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:3, Insightful)
If you pay that lifetime subscription, you have no idea what you're buying. First is the issue of whether they stay in business, as you noted. But besides that, they reserve the right to change the service at any time in the future... previous "upgrades" include reporting your viewing back to TiVo, automatically recording comercials, and now (from what I hear) interrupting fast-forwarding to
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:3, Insightful)
Not really... $300 will buy you approximately two years of programming ($12.95 a month). If Tivo lasts longer than that, you win!
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Insightful)
This puzzles me....are there really THAT many people out there that pay the monthly fee, rather than the one time lifetime sub. fee? I figure the one time chunk of money into the whole price.
Maybe its me...I hate paying monthly on something if I can get it all out of the way once and for all...
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:3, Insightful)
Lifetime subscriptions, as yours is about to attest, are really min(my lifetime, company lifetime).
People go through this with every new fad and new technology/service. Health clubs used to all have "lifetime memberships", but at least in my area that became highly regulated many years ago because so many people tho
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, the TiVo "lifetime" subscription is min(the TiVo unit's lifetime, company lifetime). Of course the only parts of the TiVo prone to failure are the hard drives and modem; the hard drive is replaceable, and the modem is circumventable. So you could say the effective lifetime of a TiVo unit is unlimited.
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:3)
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Informative)
The same way a Tivo sitting on the shelf above the cable box changes channels - there's a little IR emitter that you position in front of the box, and the Tivo sends the appropriate commands to change the channel.
With some model satellite receivers (DirecTV only, I think), the serial port on the back of the Tivo hooks up to the serial port on the back of the receiver and changes channels that way.
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you actually used on Demand? You only get what Comcast decides to store; you don't get to choose what programs you can time-shift. and, of course, you're not "storing" anything -- you're getting whatever programs are held centrally.
The "VCR-style" buttons are a joke -- there's a 4-5 second delay between your remote control button press and the response (good luck trying to stop a program at a given location!).
And, it may "seem" that the next step is full on-demand access to programming, but that's quite naive. keep in mind -- this "on demand" functionality only appeared as a response to DVR feature sets; if DVR competition were to disappear from the marketplace, and their chokehold on content distribution restored, do you really expect them to expand this functionality?!?!
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:2)
It may be a 'joke' to you, but it works and right now for free. (and you can store some things locally)
No. I don't expect them to expand functionality. I expect them to buy somebody that knows how to do it right. Then they can fuck it up well.
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:2)
You're right and you're wrong (Score:3, Informative)
You're wrong in that On Demand is Comcast's answer to TiVO. DVR is Comcast's answer to TiVo. They don't advertise it yet, but if you call Comcast, they will have a DVR box installed in your home soon. For $9.99 a month you get a dual-tuner HD box with a 120GB HD. I've had it for about 2 mo
tivo hardware costs (Score:3, Informative)
Then add the $5/month for tivo service through directv.
hawk
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Insightful)
You've missed out on having a really useful appliance for over five years. I understand being pragmatic, but that's like saying "I didn't get a computer, console, etc..) because I knew the successor would be out about a half decade later."
Re:don't have TiVo... Yet (Score:5, Insightful)
That's great that you know how to program your VCR.
Please set up your VCR to record only first-run episodes of Law & Order that come on NBC, and all episodes that come on TNT. Oh, but don't record an episode if you've recorded in the previous 30 days. And please make sure to automatically have your VCR keep up with the scheduling, so that when NBC decides to start adding one extra minute to the show to throw of your VCR, it records the extra minute as well. Oh, and if the Simpsons comes on at the same time as any of those episodes on TNT, please record those instead. And when the network delays the start of Law and Order because the baseball game went long, please make sure to have your VCR pick up on that as well. Oh, and given that I like Law and Order, could you please set up your VCR to record other shows that it feels I might be interested in.
People who make the argument that Tivo is just a smarter VCR completely miss the point. They're akin to the people who assume that any article that begins with 'Bill Gates donated $1B to help immunize people in third world countries' must end with 'in a bid to avoid paying taxes.'
Tivo is not just a smart VCR. It's not missing shows that you want to watch. It's watching your shows in 21 minutes per 30 minutes recorded. It's keeping track of schedule changes. It's coming home late at night and watching *whatever the hell you want to.*
But look on the bright side. Assuming that this (like every other doomsday article to come out about Tivo in the last five years) is correct, you can rest assured that you didn't waste any money on bending TV to your will. Me? I'm glad to have given $500 to a company who makes a great product, and I wish them the greatest success.
About TiVo (Score:5, Insightful)
Believe me, it can be very disheartening to work for an innovator in a marketplace where large established companies have such control over the distribution channels.
Cable companies and satellite companies already have a "lock" to a large extent on their customers and for them to sell an additional service such as a DVR requires so much less capital investment in marketing, and let's face it, making a good product, than it takes for a company like TiVo.
And those companies already have much deeper pockets than a small company like TiVo with which to absorb the losses associated with pushing this rather expensive technology out to users.
It's kind of funny to me that people will pay $80 cable bills without a whimper but will cry foul at the concept of paying $13 a month to TiVo to make the cable service so much more worthwhile.
Cable DVRs suck. Most people would be much happier with a TiVo and would find the extra expense to be justified. I know I'm biased but I honestly believe that.
My comments are my own and I do not speak for my employer.
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Interesting)
TiVo can provide technical innovation. Cable companies are generally not known for their ability to innovate technology or to produce compelling products such as set top boxes like TiVo with new and advanced features. They tend to "follow leads" as is obvious now with the crop of second-rate DVRs that they are releasing.
We'll see how this plays out. Either the technical superiority of TiVo will win out or the lower-cost, lower-quality options that the cable companies can offer will win out. Actually it's likely that both will win and retain some part of the market, the question is, how large a part for each respectively?
Believe me, no one at TiVo is under any delusions that we don't have to work *very hard* to stay ahead of the pack and retain technical superiority.
I feel that especially on this topic, I have to remind everyone that I speak for myself and not TiVo.
Re:About TiVo (Score:2, Insightful)
Part of my problem with TiVo is that it requires an upfront cost followed by a subscription cost. I know you can do the 300$ lifetime subscription, but thats TiVo's lifetime and currently things don't look that great. So I buy this box and a year later some new tech comes out (enter HDTV) and my box is no good. With the cable companies subscription plan, they absorb the c
Re:About TiVo (Score:4, Informative)
Not only free, but they happen automatically.
From time to time, you end up with downloads of updated software. This tends to be piecemeal for regular tivos that get it by phone, and all at once on satellite. If it needs to, it reboots at some obscure time of the morning (I think it even worns you first).
As far as competing with cable, look at their deal with directv (which may or may not be ending, depending upon which rumors you believe). Someone is subsidizing hardware costs ($99), and it's only $5/month. And look at the portion (huge majority) of tivo subscribers with directivo . .
hawk
Re:About TiVo (Score:2)
I am a very happy satellite customer and would never consider cable ever again. I would rather not have television than deal with a cable company ever again. Thus far the sat co's attempts at rolling their own DVR's have been lackluster, and I hope they decide to stick with Ti
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Interesting)
Respectfully...try DirecTV
1)they have poor installation (they just dropped wire in the middle of my living room floor, instead of putting it behind the walls). They installed my satellite on my neighbors roof
Installation is done by independent technicians, and it sounds like you had a lousy one...I know from experience this is true of both satellite and cable installers.
2)Their services DOES go out when it is bad weather, and bad does not really have to be a major storm
Again, so
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Funny)
1. In August 2000 I phoned NTL to arrange an installation of telephone and cable TV. The wiring was already in from the previous owner of my flat but I was told that they couldn't do the installation for 6 weeks (first sign I should have given up right there). I also checked on the availability of a cable modem and was told that the current service was analogue but they were up
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Insightful)
We'll see how this plays out. Either the technical superiority of TiVo will win out or the lower-cost, lower-quality options that the cable companies can offer will win out.
As an Apple watcher for 20 years, I would say this: pack up your desk. Cheaper almost always wins in the marketplace; US consumers are trained to evaluate on price first, features second. The feature has to be really visible--visible in the Best Buy or WalMart floor space where the consumer makes their purchasing decision--for it to trump price. And your features aren't; you only see the value after use. That means either taking the plunge because you didn't know alternatives exist, or were pointed to it by a friend. Compared to the free advertising ComCast has on their own channels, good luck with that.
While your product is stellar, and I'm a fanatic user myself, I think it takes too long for folks to appreciate the advantages of the TiVo. And, "too long", in this case, means >10 minutes. How do you market the advantages, without saying simply "easier to use"?
I'm really hoping that the NetFlix deal can save your asses. I'm guessing it won't; it's too far away before release, it'll take too long to download stuff, and/or not enough stuff will be available. TivoToGo, while maybe nice (I dunno, I'm a Mac user), doesn't seem to be the killer feature, either: too long to transfer.
I might suggest that you have some chance if you declare war on ComCast, since they didn't play ball with the distribution deal: allow for unrestricted copying/transfer/ad skip/archiving without ads, and only stop it if they come back to the table. That's pretty chancy, but it might the the only shot y'all have.
Good luck--really. But if it all falls apart, please consider releasing enough info to keep the current boxes useful.
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Insightful)
Let me download an MPEG2 file which I can burn with any DVD burning program
Not that DRM-protected file you give me, and not something I can only legally use Sonic MyDVD 6.1 on. Something I can feed to Nero without dancing through illegal hoops on.
Let's be honest - no one gives a crap about spending two hours to download a one hour show. We want to burn them to DVD. Period. And we don't want to futz with MythTV, we want to do it with a piece of hardware we can get
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, there are tools right now that will let you rip the DRM off of the
) but those aren't native to tivo. I'm sure a 'simpler' approach will show up soon. They (T
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah. I remember Apple. Pity they went out of business
More seriously, if they spend as long going out of business as Apple has, he can pack *very* slowly.
hawk
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Interesting)
The verb "tivo" is firmly established in the American lexicon. I'd hardly call that a failure of marketing.
Tivo's financial problems can all be directly traced back to thei strategy of, "sell the unit at a loss, make it up on volume."
TiVo puts nice software on top of their commodity hardware platform, but they haven't done anything significant to put them ahead of the imitators.
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Insightful)
The best feature of Tivo, the one the makes it worth the (rather high) cost is its ability to find shows for you. I'd come home saying, "I want to watch a nature documentary" and find that Tivo had already recorded a half dozen, including a couple I didn't even know were on. Judging from what I've heard from other Tivo owners, this is a universally popular feature. Yet they never advertised it at all.
Re:About TiVo (Score:4, Insightful)
Also, maybe I'm in the minority, but I've found that TiVo hasn't killed my interest in live TV. It's just changed the way that I watch live TV. Instead of melting down the remote searching for 2-3 minute snippets of something to watch on other channels while avoiding the commercials on the channel I'm watching, I simply pick out two shows to watch (I have DirecTiVo) and switch back and forth skipping the commercials for both.
If anything, TiVo needs to figure out a way to get 2 tuner support into its regular line of DVRs. People who've never used a DirecTiVo don't understand just how powerful that second tuner really is. Not only that, it's a feature that can be easily sold to customers without even seeing it in action. Just have some husband saying he doesn't miss his favorite show because his wife's show is on. Or some woman saying she can still watch the rose parade despite the fact that her boyfriend's bowl games are on at the same time.
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree, but not for the reasons you cite. The fact is that most people just don't grasp the fact that a VCR or a PVR has its own tuner. It's an obvious fact to any gadget-geek like you or me, but try to explai
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Informative)
tee hee. Thanks for the morning laugh. You've obviously been at Tivo too long. What the cable companies have done with their little one-way coax network defies belief... Trust me. I work for one (sort of... long story). Try to find another single service provider who can give you everything the cable plant does on 2 conductors. Cab
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Interesting)
Cable companies were simply in the fortunate position to be able to re-purpose infrastructure that they had already laid down for another purpose (analog TV distribution). And the repurposing that they did took extra investment in digital set top boxes and cable modem hardware, and who knows whatever infrastructure at their head end. No innovation there at all. It's not like they "invented" the internet or any service thereon that by happy coincidence for them have added value to their service.
DirecTV with TiVo DVRs have all of the advantages that you mentioned about the SA boxes, and they're better DVRs to boot.
I speak for me and not TiVo again (obviously).
Fast Followers and Disruptive Technology (Score:4, Insightful)
If you haven't already it sounds like you need to read The Innovator's Dilemma [amazon.com] by Clayton Christensen. The DVRs the cable companies put out don't have to be better to put TiVo out of business. They just have to be good enough, cheaper and easy to get. Being a technology leader is only valuable if three things are true. First, that you can stay a technology leader and protect that position. (through futher innovation, patents, etc) Second, that your technology leadership either lets you be the low cost provider OR that customers value your technology such that it lets you charge a premium for your services. Third, that you have economicly viable access to the right distribution channels. TiVo is arguably the technology leader in the DVR industry but I think it is failing on the maybe the second and definitely the third conditions.
Let me give you an example. Most of us criticize (rightly IMO) Microsoft for a lack of innovation. But being the leader isn't always the best business strategy. Economists call Microsoft a fast follower. They don't innovate. They don't know how to. And if they tried, they'd fail. But what they do very successfully is watch the leaders in the market and then copy their innovations while leveraging their strengths in marketing, distribution. OS/2 challeged Windows NT a few years back. Result? Windows 95. It wasn't better than OS/2 technologically but it was good enough and Microsoft controled the distribution channels. (plus IBM shot themselves in the foot repeatedly) They can learn from the innovations and mistakes of the innovators and come out with a good enough product that most customers will buy. Sure, it's not a glamorous strategy but being a fast follower can be very, very effective.
The downside of being a fast follower? You might not be able to catch the market leader if you aren't quick enough. Microsoft hasn't been able to catch Intuit with their Microsoft Money product despite years of trying. They got caught on the wrong side of an installed base. Being a successful fast follower requires lots of resources and an acute ear for what the market is telling you. But it also means that if there is a fundamental shift in the market or if you misread the market, you're screwed. Microsoft may have be screwed because Open Source could be one of those tectonic shifts ("disruptive technologies" in my Christensen's terminologies) that fundamentally alters the market place such that their own organizational structure no longer permits them to compete effectively. Whether this is actually the case remains the be seen.
The other problem with being a fast follower is that if you are too good, you end up a monopoly with no on to copy from. As a result a successful fast follower either stagnates or has to move into other industries to grow. Microsoft is in this position right now. Their core OS and Office products are stagnant monopolies. Very profitable but unlikely to provide massive growth. So Microsoft is having to branch out into other lines of business. Dell is doing somewhat the same thing. They're so successful in selling PC's they are having to branch into printers, PDAs and other technologies to continue to grow.
Re:About TiVo (Score:2)
Although not an apples-to-apples comparison, but I won't even consider going back to cable from DirecTV until cable can offer a DVR that can record 2 shows at once and also record HD content. Trust me, I'm terribly unhappy with the lack of feature updates coming from DirecTV for their TiVo boxes, and I'd jump back to cable as soon as a comparable offering was available.
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Interesting)
It's only a matter of time before your local cable company has similar features.
I also have a Series 2 Tivo, which has been relegated to bedroom duty, and had a Series 1 in the past. I have LOVED Tivo (both the product and the company) since 2001. Tivo's software is *slightly* easier to use than my Comcast DVR, but until they catch up in HD support they will lose ground.
Re:About TiVo (Score:2)
Alternatively, I can record 1 show while watching another.
Re:About TiVo (Score:2)
Re:About TiVo (Score:2)
The designers of the Cable DVR are either a bunch of incredible fools, or could care less about the viewing experience of the customer (probably a little bit of both).
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Interesting)
2. Fast forward works better with TiVo. While fast-forwarding, when I hit the play button, the TiVo automatically backs up a few seconds, then plays, i.e., it takes into account the lag time between the moment my brain comprehends that I'm a
Re:About TiVo (Score:4, Informative)
That's a good show, BTW.
My DVR is the Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300 (I think) offered by Cox. Perhaps Time Warner offers a better service, but when you have over 200 channels, browsing by title or genre is, for me, a frustrating waste of time.
This is especially true when the "genre" is just "Movie". I mean, there is a big difference between, say "War And Peace" and "Earnest Goes To Camp".
The TiVo Wishlist function is fantastic. For instance: I was watching the "Foyle's War" series on PBS last year. The star of that series is Michael Kitchen. I liked it so much, that I set up a wishlist to find any programs with Michael Kitchen in them.
The cable-supplied DVR probably looks great to anyone who has never used a TiVo before, but I've become spoiled.
Re:About TiVo (Score:4, Insightful)
True, but...
* I want a DVI+SPDIF/HDMI input and HD recording capability
* I want faster menus and wishlist processing
* I want nobody to ever mess with 30 second skip. DO NOT FUCK WITH 30 SECOND SKIP.
* I want to be able to watch my TiVo recordings on my P800 fone and/or a video iPod
* weather, stock, headline, etc. applets would be nice.
Cable DVRs do suck, but they also do digital sound and hi-def. They don't handle DVD burning though, and I _may_ upgrade to a DVD-capable DVR in the next few months, remains to be seen whether it's a TiVo unit or some kind of HTPC Linux box..
Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
I got the Charter DVR service from Charter Communications as a test, which is a Motorola BMC9012 running Digeo's MOXI software.
When first set up, the skip button was a 30 second skip, and replay was a 7 second reverse jump.
After the box downloaded its first software update, the skip button stopped working. It became a 15 minute skip. What the fuck purpose is a 15 minute skip?
I called Charter to inquire about this. I asked what the purpose of the 15 minute skip button was; they responded that it was to jump quickly into a program (WTF?). I asked them why it was no longer a 30 second skip. The person I was talking to responded that it was "illegal" to have a 30 second skip.
After I recovered myself from this egregiously wrong statement, I informed him there was no state of federal law prohibiting a 30 second skip on a PVR, and further informed him of other PVRs that do just that. He insisted there was "a law". I asked to speak to his supervisor, who again told me it was "against the law" to have a 30 second skip, and that Charter had to "obey they law". I again informed him there was no such law, and asked him to cite any such law. The conversation essentially went nowhere. I tried the next day with the same result.
While pondering the absurdity of it all, I got a call back from a manager at Charter who had apparently become aware of my call. He apologized for the phone representatives saying that it was "illegal"...he said, essentially, that they shouldn't have said it was "illegal" or "against the law", but that Charter had "legal concerns" with its content providers and advertisers. I pointed out that Charter's corporate "legal concerns" are a lot different than something being "illegal", and that the phone agents might not want to tell people that.
But ultimately, how many people will get DVR services like this and never know there was such a thing as a 30-second skip? They'll be tickled that they can record 40 hours of video (not knowing they could record 400 by just adding a drive, which of course is disabled on this box) and fast forward through commercials like a VCR, and that they can pay Charter an extra monthly fee to watch the recorded content on another TV in their own home (not knowing that it's technically possible to also watch it on their laptop, PDA, portable media player, or anywhere else they should be able to watch it). And the ones who do know about the 30-second skip will probably swallow Charter's "we can't do it because it's illegal" copout.
And when July rolls around, those same people won't wonder how we're unable to do things we could do 30 years ago with the VCR when their DVR box tells them they're not allowed to record ER in HD (and that they must watch it live), and a call to Charter only elicits the blameless "Well, we have to follow what the TV networks make us do - it's not our fault..."
The cable and satellite providers might be in the best position to provide DVR services that can tune all of the subscribed channels on their networks directly, without having to have some kind of convoluted IR Blaster setup or multiple settops, but they're also in the best position to severely restrict the featuresets and functionality of those boxes as well...
Re:Too late (Score:3, Insightful)
For that matter, why don't VCR (and now DVD) players have 2-level sound settings? I've noticed that movies generally have ultra-loud scenes and soft scenes, like battles and conversations; it would be useful to have 2 sound levels set to accomodate these.
Re:About TiVo (Score:2, Interesting)
Granted, TiVo has a much lower price point than, say, a small EPIA. But, for example, until July 1st, HDTV capture cards are available. And you can take a Linux PVR and do all sorts of neat stuff with it--add a RAID array, share the files over samba, etc.
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Insightful)
A $100 price point and that "works out of the box" experience.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Insightful)
But I agree with your fundamental point that it's the subsidy that they can give to their customers in the monthly fee area and hardware that is most significant.
Re:About TiVo (Score:2)
TiVo where I have access to what I record would be useful. As it stands, my old Series 1 has died and I am almost certainly going with MythTV or EyeTV (Mac) because I will have access to what I have recorded. DRM'd Tivo To Go is garbage.
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm a control freak. I like to know what's going on and who's doing it.
Tivo controls the box. They control the size of the drive inside the box, they control the data that's on the box, and they ultimately could control what can and cannot be saved onto the box.
And while it is true that some can "hack" the box, Tivo has not given users permission to do so.
Tivo alone maintains control and
Re:About TiVo (Score:2)
Seriously, why doesn't TiVo license its cool interface and technology into the existing cable boxes? I would love it if my Comcast box had TiVo software on it, because TiVo knows how to write good software. Who cares what hardware it runs on?
Also, I think TiVo should get into writing PVR software for PCs for hackers. Although, hackers hardly pay for anything, so maybe that's not such a good idea.
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Insightful)
I used to live in the UK (where Tivo have to all intents and purposes closed down) and was one of the few die hard Tivo'ers. I had my box, hacked in a bigger HD, added the network card, TivoWeb, etc etc. When Sky+ came along I defended Tivo to the hilt - it _was_ better. The menus were better, the season passes worked better, it was much more friendly to non-techs.
So anyway, now I live in the US. I have cable TV (satellite isn't available in my build
Re:About TiVo (Score:3, Insightful)
I cancelled my Tivo service about a month ago. I was an early adopter -- I had a unit within a month or so of their release, and by my best estimates somewhere around 40 people have Tivos right now because of firsthand contact with seeing mine. Who knows how many people got them by seeing those people's Tivos.
Why did I cancel? Tivo is
Re:About TiVo (Score:5, Interesting)
Also you are providing evidence for at least some of my points - believe me there is no way that cable companies could push such *very expensive* technology as dual-tuner HD pvrs without the deep pockets that they have to absorb the losses that must be associated with that product. There is just no way that $10/month can support the development of, production of, and distribution of that product.
maybe (Score:4, Interesting)
ChipGuy (Score:5, Funny)
Here's the original [slashdot.org].
Re:ChipGuy (Score:3, Informative)
Proof (Score:4, Insightful)
You either have to roll over completley or get ready for a long hard battle that you will win. TIVO wimped out and tried to make everyone happy, in the process making very few people happy. They'll get bought by someone. I'd like it to be Apple, but I'm skeptical.
Re:Nonsense (Score:3, Informative)
The cable company product most definitely is NOT a better product. Can you fast forward through American Idol? Not on some Comcast supplied boxes. That's just a preview of what you can expect in the future as your ability to fast forward, skip commercials, retain recordings for long times, etc.. is stripped from those boxes.
Cue the haters (Score:5, Funny)
1. "My cable company's DVR works just fine, why should I pay extra for a TiVO?"
2. "I don't watch TV, why do I want a TiVo?"
3. "My MythTV box only took me 3 weeks to get working, and I will probably only have to mess with the guide data stream a few times a year, and the hardware only cost twice as much as a TiVo."
We've heard them all before...
I don't watch TV, why would I want a TIVO? (Score:2)
I do not watch TV, I do not have cable or satellite. I do watch DVDs for which I have a suitable TV for them.
I think TIVO is a nice technology but I have zero use for one. Best of luck to them. Don't classify those of us who do not watch TV as "haters"
Cue economics 101 (Score:3, Interesting)
A cable DVR from Crime-Warner is like $8 a month and does several things SA Tivos don't do, like digital sound and HD, and doesn't require hackery like IR emitters and glacial channel changing speeds.
I'll agree that it's substandard software to be sure, but when ordinary people make decisions it comes down to money -- an SA Tivo takes YEARS (box + lifetime) before its ROI exceeds the cable box, and the cable box can be traded
Re:I'm not a 'hater' (Score:3, Insightful)
I used to think the same thing; I quit television 5 years ago, when I realized I didn't get nearly enough out of it to warrant the time I spent in fron of it. My roommate had a tube, but I only ever used it for DVDs and video games. Then, less than a year ago, he got a TiVo. I watch TV again, now. Not a ton -- less than an hour on an average day. But I get a lot more pleasure out of it than when I was watching t
Steps (Score:5, Interesting)
2. Tivo provides nice search interface for Tivo BitTorrent client.
3. Tivo provides centralized Torrent servers and includes content in $12.95.
4. Goodbye cable!
Has anybody tried the new SDK [sourceforge.net]? It's pretty cool...they should have done it from the beginning.
Re:Steps (Score:2)
And? (Score:5, Insightful)
But, since we've been told to start sharing our unininformed opinions:
1) I don't see where turning TiVo into an Internet storage device is a huge win. Yeah, maybe it's a good idea and they should do it, but that will be just as easy for others to duplicate as the PVR business.
2) I'm not sure whether Jarvis is hinting that they should become a warez enabler, but if he is, that's a dead-end business plan. As surely as piracy will continue to exist, that surely will it remain impossible to run a major business on that model in developed countries.
Ala-carte viewing (Score:4, Insightful)
Sounds great (Score:5, Interesting)
I say they get bought by Comcast or Time Warner before the end of the decade.
I want my IP TV (Score:2, Interesting)
Tivo box after TIVO exits (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Tivo box after TIVO exits (Score:3, Informative)
Series 1 boxes stay as 'dumb' VCRs. Series 2 boxes, apparently not.
However, the TiVo is very hackable, and people (reportedly) know how to add guide data. Such hacks are unreleased now out of respect for TiVo, but if they go out of business they'll probably be availab
The first out of the gate almost always loses (Score:3, Interesting)
I would be MORE shocked if Tivo actually survived.
Re:The first out of the gate almost always loses (Score:2)
And once again, Sony was the FIRST to sell its video recorders to consumers.
And since you've been wrong twice already, I doubt that your opinions on Tivo or Diamond have much credibility either.
Who should be checking their facts, moron?
TiVo will fail. (Score:5, Insightful)
The reasons are simple:
1. The cable companies are rolling their own DVRs. TiVo failed to get traction here, and it will kill them.
2. TiVo has hobbled itself. There were features out there that could have helped them (essentially value adds above and beyond the cable company DVRs), but they were too slow to market, and too restrictive in their implementation. Examples: TiVo to Go. Network-able TiVos. Commercial skip. Good features, but TiVo hobbled them (or implemented them late) either through proprietary standards or by not officially advertising them to Joe Sixpack.
Too Many Tivo Posts! (Score:2, Informative)
Will New Apps Keep TiVo Afloat? - Feb. 16 (Answer: NO)
Has TiVo's Fate Been Sealed? Jan. 17 (Answer: NO)
The No's have it now Die TiVo Die!
Star Trek Enterprise, Arrested Development, etc.. (Score:2, Interesting)
What about DirecTivo (Score:2)
This just in: Tivo passes 3 million subscribers (Score:5, Funny)
Is it dying faster or slower then Apple and BSD?
Disclaimer: Not a Tivo subscriber. I'd like to, but you can't get some of that in Canada.
Over half are directv, and directv ditched tivo. (Score:3, Insightful)
They're probably still raking in customers, but the majority of them are still DirecTV folks. And those will start to disappear as DirecTV drops support and people start upgrading in a few years. I believe the contract is through 2007. With DirecTV's impending move to MPEG
DirecTivo (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyone who has tried Comcast's alternative to Tivo knows that the interface is completely horrible. It actually makes me angry just to think about it.
When I move this summer, I'm planning on continuing with DirecTV service rather than switching to cable strictly because of the tight integration with Tivo. The Tivo partnership is already a huge asset to DirecTV, they might as well add Tivo to their balance sheet and make it official.
Tivo is my favorite robot friend (next is Roomba). Tivo has made TV fun and interesting again. I discovered Battlestar Galactica thanks to Tivo. I think I'd cry if Tivo died... seriously.
Re:DirecTivo (Score:3, Informative)
Fixing TiVo? (Score:4, Interesting)
A good first step would be a CableCard-enabled TiVo, so that it can sit directly on those DRM-laden digital cable nets. But there has to be a significant [b]perceived[/b] improvement over the existing cableco-owned PVR. Multiple tuners, better UI, HD... but it's going to be awfully hard to generate revenue when the cableco's give their boxes away.
Too bad there's no CableCard equivalent for DirecTV, VOOM, and EchoStar.
Apple's Tivo Videocasting Service or iTunes+Video (Score:3, Insightful)
Build a content sales and distribution network to feed you hardware business.
Apple uses iTunes to promote iPods. Tivo should build an internet version of a cable specialty channel, and distribute content. Bittorrent does it now, Tivo can do it for the Tivoted.
Apple are you listening? A repackaged Mac Mini (Mac PVR) with TV tuner, more storage, a dedicated remote control and a bittorrent flavoured version of iTunes. And while you are at it buy Tivo. And remember, do it with STYLE
You mean just like ReaplyTV? (Score:3, Insightful)
And they could include networking hardware for free, and networking software for free, and share TV over the Internet, and share it to the PC using free open source software, and then they could change their name to ReplayTV since they have been doing all of that for years?
Yes, sharing and auto-commercial-skipping is disabled in the new ones, but who buys the new ones.
But seriously, if Tivo copied everything my Replay does (and maybe call it "innovating" like they did with Tivo To Go) and let me **store** and play my MP3s from the Tivo, I would covert in a heartbeat. I have yet to see a stereo component that lets me store my MP3s - I either have to use my portable, or spend $300 for a fancy LCD that needs my computer running 24/7.
Actually, Tivo can come back with HDTV (Score:3, Insightful)
I think *because* of HDTV that Tivo will come back.
Cable/Satelite $65 per month with DVR functionality
Over the Air HDTV $14 per month with Tivo service
I'll save the extra $50 a day gladly.
Bankruptcy (Score:3, Informative)
Here's why TiVo won't live on (Score:3, Interesting)
This means that dual-tuner TiVos won't work unless you have two cable boxes, too.
And then there's the HD problem: TiVos other than DirecTiVos can't record it. This is a big deal for those of us who have switched over to HDTV. I like being able to time-shift a prettier picture.
I have the Motorola HDTV dual-tuner DVR at home, on Comcast cable. It may not do exactly what a TiVo does, but it's very close. I can set it up to record every time a new episode of a show comes on. I can make it record 2 TV shows, in HD, simultaneously. I can get on-demand programming. And you can even hack the remote (and I use "hack" loosely here) to give you back your precious 30-second skip.
It doesn't make show recommendations for me, but honestly, I don't care. It does everything else, and it does it well. My parents have TiVo, and they can't record one show while watching another, nor can they time-shift HDTV content.
TiVo has to fix these shortcomings somehow. It may be that the only way is to partner with the cable companies to get access to the cable box hardware.
Re:Here's why TiVo won't live on (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.tivo.com/5.3.1.1.asp?article=234 [tivo.com]
1/6/2005
TiVo Developing High-Definition, Digital Cable Ready DVR
TiVo® DVR with CableCARD Will Offer Flexible, Fully Featured Platform for Accessing HD Broadcast and Broadband Content
January 6, 2005 - CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW, Las Vegas, NV - TiVo (NASDAQ: TIVO) today will demonstrate a high definition, digital cable ready DVR that will enable TiVo subscr
What's the revenue model for the SDK? (Score:3, Interesting)
But that's me. I'm a geek. How are they going to make money from that, does anybody know? Is there a plan to start buying applications from the community and selling them as add on services or something? Or perhaps licensing them so that I as an author make some money based on how many people subscribe to my application? (Imagine the horror show of technical support THAT would be!)
Surely they can't have gone through all this trouble just to keep we coders thrilled. How does this scale to the larger audience and get Tivo back in the game?
Slightly offtopic/ Fix the reception method (Score:3, Insightful)
I have long believed that the providers should only have to install one box in my house in the basement where the cable enters the house. That box should decode all the channels that I have contacted for with my provider. Then those signals should be sent to all of the cable outlets in my house. They used to do something similar to this (I lived in an apartment in Marlborough, MA that did this up until 1999) with the channels effectively de-scrambled at the pole. Only the cable entered the apartment and any TV could watch any channel including the premium ones. Alas that ended in early 2000 when they sent us a letter saying would have to get boxes for continued premium service. (Might I add right after we got the box and all was well for a brief time, we also had to 4 day outage when the screwed the whole transition up, that's another story.)
TiVo probably deserves to die (Score:3, Interesting)
First, key features that loyal customers raved about have been removed from more recent products (preseumably as a result of pressure from content-owners). So we have a product that in some ways is getting worse rather than better.
Second, I find the interface quite clumsy. (Sure, it's PRETTY.) It seems like every operation has extra, pointless steps (many of which are confirming non-destructive operations). There is no undo (you can't undelete a program you just deleted in error). The remote control is almost axially symmetric, meaning that in the dark it's quite easy to point it in exactly the wrong direction.
Third, the out-of-box experience is terrible. It initially needs several hours just to start working (I have no idea why) and it initially incorrectly identified where I live and refused to download the right TV timetable. Even when this was corrected, it continues to record infomercials and label them "Scrubs".
Finally, TiVo persistently tries to sell stuff to you.
TiVo's problems, I think, lie in (a) a failure to decide who their customer is and serve their needs and (b) a lack of attention to usability.
Item (a) is a strategic problem (they seem torn between wanting to partner with content providers, wanting to become a content provider and sell their own advertising space, and wanting to become a video napster 1.0), whereas (b) is tactical (they simply need to stop paying attention to their fawning fans and do some serious self-criticism).
Re:Bad idea (Score:2, Insightful)
Damn those greedy customers, expecting more and more for what they will surely be willing to pay for.
Re:Free TiVo? (Score:4, Insightful)
That's funny!
Indeed, everything should always be free. We should all get paid for doing our work, but should be able to get all of the stuff and services we want for free. That would be perfect! And then, cool new free companies would have all sorts of incentives to hire lots of people to invent even cooler new things that they'd give away for free! Excellent! Everyone would just have all sorts of money, and all sorts of cool things, too! Fantastic!