Tivo Hacking A-OK - Says Tivo

s|eeper writes: "C|Net just posted an article about Tivo publicly stating that at this time, they have no problem with people hacking their Tivos to add more disk space."

Comments

Re:More solid information?

[Rombuu]

Why would Tivo care anyway? Tivo makes their money on the subscriptions service and selling placement on their entertainment guide. As long as people don't expect tech support from Tivo for their modified boxes, Tivo probably would even encourage this sort of thing..

Now Phillips and Sony may not care for this too much...

Re:Well, DUH!

[Rombuu]

Doubtful, since Tivo doesn't actually sell the boxes...

Re:New PC system to replace TIVO

[NetJunkie]

REALLY?! A cron job and a TV card give me what TiVo has? I get updated TV listings? I can put in my preferences and have it record things I might like? I get the great user interface?! AMAZING! Try again.

Obligatory Steven Wright Reference

[Nova Express]

> Or will they simply revert to subliminal mind control techniques? :)

"I once met a subliminal advertising executive, but only for a second."

It changes like this..

[Talonius]

Advertising is already changing.

I wish I had the link, but here's what happened during the World Series:

Those banners on the wall weren't really there, or if they were there, they were different than what you say. They had a realtime substitution of other banners.

Basically what you think you're seeing on television ISN'T what you're seeing. And it's there, in the show, so yea..

Pretty subliminal to me, but I don't watch television, unless it's Blue's Clues with my son. :p

Same thing with Friends - they had an episode where a thing of Oreos sat on the counter - they weren't there during filming, they were added post process.

-- Talonius

Re:How will advertising change?

[chaobell]

God, please tell me I'm not the only person in the world that remembers this...blipverts!

Remember the pilot episode of Max Headroom? Where they were testing out these little ultra-compressed two-second or so commercials they called "blipverts?" They worked, but they had a minor unpleasant side effect...namely, causing people to randomly explode.

But then again, I think that if I see another damned Old Navy commercial, my brain will explode anyway, so I doubt anyone would notice the difference. ^_^

Re:More solid information?

[Phil Wherry]

While the article doesn't provide a lot of information to actually support the idea that TiVo doesn't have a problem with upgrade hacking, the fact is that TiVo has been one of the most hacker-tolerant consumer electronics companies I've ever seen. A lot of the credit rests with Richard Bullwinkle, the company's Internet spokesman/evangelist. His recent comments on AVS Forum pretty clearly illustrate the attitude I'm talking about:

Well, I'm sure many of you have been waiting for anything I might say about the "hacking" of TiVo, so let me put on my best Yoda voice, and see if I can spread some wisdom. First, let me give credit where credit is due. That was no easy task, and those guys are pretty stunning engineers to have gotten into the places they did in the first place.

Second, let me give a bit of warning -- more as a friend than a corporate entity. PLEASE BE CAREFUL. TiVo's are not designed to be opened. Anyone who has ever been inside a computer knows that power supplies for user-upgradeable equipment should be covered. TiVo's is not, because it is not designed to be user-upgradeable . I'm not worried about this from a legal perspective, because that little sticker that says "Risk of Electric Shock -- Do Not Open" covers me pretty well in the eyes of the law , but it would break my heart to hear of someone who hurt themselves going inside their TiVo.

Third, make backups. We already know of one thing that is going to affect you guys with the release of 2.0, and we would feel bad if we made your TiVo useless after we changed the software somehow, but we of course would take no financial responsibility for that. We want to keep you happy TiVo customers, but we will not risk relationships with partners or do any special testing to make sure hacked boxes work. The thing we will do that will affect you, that we already know about, is the same thing that makes 2x30 GB machines 60 hours instead of 72. In short, we have never created a box over 30 hours, and any receivers over 30 hours that are out there when we release our new software will have about 12 hours taken away. Any programs within that space will be deleted. Consider this fair warning.

Finally, please be cool about this. We have already taken down AVS with floods about the subject. You don't want to anger people and force them to take action about this.

By the way, as far as hacking goes, don't interfere with the TiVo service. Anyone who tries to steal it, copy it, or modify the way it works in a negative way will receive instant ramifications from TiVo. I don't mean to be a heavy, but that is what puts food on my family's table.

How is that for straight shooting? If you have questions, I will try to answer them here.

Cheers,
Richard Bullwinkle
TiVolutionary

Re:How will advertising change?

[b1t r0t]

Perhaps they will force the manufacturers to put in code that, upon hitting a commercial break, diables any fast-forwarding until the commercial break is over. This would be relatively easy to do if commercial codes were somehow encoded somewhere in an unused portion of the video signal.

I suppose this isn't impossible, if the "this is a commercial" signal were put in the vertical retrace area along with closed captioning and stuff, but then it would be easier for people to make VCRs that pause when they see that signal!

On the other hand, if they stuck in the signal for random 30 second intervals in the middle of TV shows, then the equipment would have to think twice about pausing recording. But that would only be a problem with tape-based systems. A disc-based system like Tivo can just back up when it detects a "commercial" of more than 2 minutes. Or it could let you decide for yourself (after all, humans are very good at deciding what is and is not a commercial) and use a "30 second skip" button. Which is what it does.

Re:Why is this news?

[ncc74656]

"Why would TiVo be concerned what you do with your box once you buy it?" Maybe you should ask the same question of Netpliance. The article on cnet refers to an earlier article describing Netpliance's efforts to thwart hardware hackers who'd convert their i-openers into ordinary PCs. I think it's a good thing that TiVo is keeping a more open mind about this. (I suppose it also helps that TiVo isn't the actual hardware manufacturer. Maybe they'd take a different view if they were in the hardware business instead of the software-and-service business. Then again, if they're using Linux as the foundation of their system, maybe their view is sufficiently enlightened that even if they were producing the hardware, they still really couldn't care less if people hacked their boxes to add more storage.) As long as people don't crack their system to get the programming-guide service for free, TiVo ought to be happy.

_/_
/ v \
(IIGS( Scott Alfter (remove Voyager's hull # to send mail)
\_^_/

How will advertising change?

[boss soul]

It seems like if they allow people to add HD space at their own discretion, this stands as yet another selling point for this product. Considering this, I wonder...

If TIVO, and products like it, become more and more popular, will the very nature of advertising on television change as a result?

My friend owns one of those TIVO thingies, and it seems like he never watches any commercials at all... he just pre-records all his favorate shows, and then zips thru the ads with the 30 second-skip button. If it gets to the point where most viewers are using a service that allows them to do this, how will the networks change the format of ads in order to compensate? Will they place them during the shows themselves, or in the form of product placement?

Or will they simply revert to subliminal mind control techniques? :)

Re:How will advertising change?

[British]

Ahh yes, Edison Carter. About every month, there's always 1 slashdot story that a Max Headroom episode covered 14 years ago.

Re:How will advertising change?

[eyeball]

If TIVO, and products like it, become more and more popular, will the very nature of advertising on television change as a result?

Rest assurred that if even a single dollar is lost because of this, the advertisers will likely spend a few bucks and lobby hardcore to make such digital recording devices illegal, citing DMCA, copyright legalities, and in general going on a napster-like witch hunt. That is, if the MPAA doesn't get there first when they realize that soon TiVo hackers will be able to back up entire TV shows and movies to CD and friends' harddrives.

Perhaps they will force the manufacturers to put in code that, upon hitting a commercial break, diables any fast-forwarding until the commercial break is over. This would be relatively easy to do if commercial codes were somehow encoded somewhere in an unused portion of the video signal.

Actually, there would be little preventing Sony or Phillips from creating a protocol to capture and record comercials seporately and forcing people to watch them. Or maybe they would rather be able to insert their own advertisements. It would be interesting to see the legal implecations of this: if you record a 30 minute show, but instead of allowing you to fast forward through the original 8 minutes of commercials that came with the broadcast, you are forced to watch a different 8 minutes of commercials that Sony/Phillips wants you to see. Oh yeah, the broadcasters (or more likely the broadcasters' salespeople) would be pissed!

Or maybe like you said, TV producers will start placing ads inline with the TV programs, which has already started to a certain extent. One of the cable channels (Discovery Channel I think) will sometimes squish the screen up about 80% for about 30 seconds, and place an message at the bottom saying "see our web site..." or "coming up after this show...". A few other channels (TBS or USA I think) also do something like this by superimposing a similar self-promoting small transparent message in the bottom right corner of the screen for a half minute or so. Sure, it's not a paid advertisment... yet.

One also has to wonder if Sony/Phillips have any code in TiVo to display advertisments in bit image form, either when it boots, during a show, between commercial breaks, or whatever. (gdb anyone?)

Re:How will advertising change?

[WNight]

What I'm waiting for, as soon as their proprietary storage format is documented is people to start posting timings for various networks commercials...

On The Simpsons, on FOX, tonight, the commercials start at exactly 134,293ms into the show, and continue until 218,134ms... Then a program on the TiVo could transfer these timing codes from the PC via the serial cable and actually strip the commercials out, making for a smaller recorded show.

It's pretty simply to remove chunks on an MPEG file, requiring at most a new keyframe for each cut... Not rocket science.

I wanna build my own

[Randy Rathbun]

But there are some problems that I see right off the bat that need correcting - and they can be. But are they already?

The main problem, as I see it, is where to get the program information. There are places like Click TV that give really good program guides, but I would think the commercial outfits would get mighty pissed if I wrote something that repackaged their program guide. Is there a open TV listing system, like the Free CDDB is to CDDB?

More solid information?

[Cardinal]

Is it just me, or did C-Net build this story around a quote and an inference from a single Tivo representative (Rebecca Baer)?

I'm glad Mr. Hill has no problem with people hacking Tivos, but he isn't a Tivo rep.

So.. Is there a better source on Tivo's perspective on the matter? After all, recent C-Net stories haven't exactly been fountains of indisputable and reliable information... :)

Could the tivo be made to acknowledge cue dots?

[grahamsz]

In the UK on two of our channels (itv and channel4) we have what are called cue dots in the corner of the screen which indicate that adverts are about to start... this could perhaps be used to chop adverts out all together.

The other factor you could use to acknowledge advertising is that it is generally slightly louder than the original program. It will also usually have a higher range of frequencies since high frequencies carry more energy - making you pay more attention to the add (supposibly :)

Re:Why is this news?

[stickyc]

I think a closer parallel would be:
You buy a Ford, rip out the engine and replace it with a Studebaker engine with more HP. A few months later, something goes wrong so you return to the shop expecting a warrantee repair. The mechanic's a nice guy and a bit of a Studebaker hacker, so he fixes it anyhow (or maybe he tries and fails), but you posted how to replace the engine on the net and now there's a line of 50 Fords with Studebaker engines all suffering some problem hoping for a repair. This mean's Ford has several options:
-Agree to fix Studebaker engines, which means working a deal with Studebaker for parts (which wont be nearly as cheap as Ford parts) and sending all the mechanics to Studebaker school. Not cheap in the short run, not cheap in the long run.
-Ignore these customers and state "We don't fix modified Fords" to stop people sending modified units back, incurring the wrath of the customer base.
-Accept modified units but charge out-of-warrantee repair fees. This works fine until someone puts a Mazda turbo on the Studebaker engine and posts results to the net. Suddenly, Ford has to send all mechanics to Studebaker AND Mazda school (and narrows hiring choices to mechanics who know Ford, Studebaker, and Mazda, which are very scarce in Silicon Valley and want premium cash & stock options) and negotiate parts deals with Mazda. This becomes a never-ending cycle and results in high repair fees and Ford spending a lot more energy on repairs and a lot less on making new cars (which again incurs the wrath of the customer base because Ford "isn't spending enough energy innovating").
Or worse yet, Ford comes out with a free chip upgrade that adds tons of HP and drives fuel economy down more than any upgrade that the hackers have been doing, but doesn't work with the now-wimpy Studebaker engines, so now everyone is in a huff because Ford's not supporting the innovators (or as most customers will say "screwing over the hackers") and they're left with weaker machines than if they'd just left the hood down in the first place.

Hacking is GOOD for TiVo

[BubbaFett]

Geek hacks TiVo, adds features, makes it better, makes it GPL. TiVo likes mods, adds them to next version, everybody benefits. I'm waiting for my RAIDed, mp3 playing, networkable, quake playing TiVo. Seeya WebTV!

Re:Hacking is GOOD for TiVo

[tsangc]

Geek hacks TiVo, adds features, makes it better, makes it GPL. TiVo likes mods, adds them to next version, everybody benefits. I'm waiting for my RAIDed, mp3 playing, networkable, quake playing TiVo. Seeya WebTV!

Has anyone ever considered some features as not beneficial to Tivo? As Open Source advocates, most folks here think any feature is a good feature. But that's not the case in all situations, especially not if you're trying to run a business.

What if someone figures out how to hack a Tivo to download TV Guide listings off the web instead of their schedule service, effectively freeing the machine from monthly fees? That'd kill Tivo's business model. So no, hacking is not always good.

A lot of folks here don't realize that companies don't just sell hardware anymore-in Netpliance and Tivo's case, the hardware platform is just the entry-the software and more importantly, service, is the key part of their business.

--Calum

go TIVO

[haus]

I am glad to see that some people are willing to be reasonable. It is true that those who decide to experiment and tinker with the world around them, can indeed live in harmony with those who choose not to.

Let's hope that this attitude continues when someone finds away to store their now decrypted DVD files [thanks to DeCSS] on their modified TIVO box [with the extra 80Gig IDE hard drive].

Isn't technology great?

all persons, living and dead, are purely coincidental. - Kurt Vonnegut

Funny...

[american_bongo]

When I tried to do a search to find out about TiVo on MSNBC, I got these results.

AOL's epic aim: to slay Microsoft
http://www.msnbc.com/news/280218.asp
The golden fleece that America Online, Sun Microsystems and Netscape are chasing is nothing less than developing the dominant computing platform -- one that makes Microsoft's Windows irrelevant.

Harvard, MIT fight Microsoft over research about Netscape
http://www.msnbc.com/news/200480.asp
Harvard and Massachusetts Institute of Technology are fighting a demand from Microsoft for two professors' research on Netscape. Separately, Microsoft released some evidence it will use in the antitrust case, revealing a likely legal strategy.

Microsoft says it violated no antitrust laws
http://www.msnbc.com/news/359094.asp
Microsoft on Tuesday said that despite a court's finding that it holds monopoly power, the evidence presented against it during the government's antitrust case doesn't add up to illegal behavior. By Brock N. Meeks

Microsoft hopes to use book to show it won browser battle fairly
http://www.msnbc.com/news/204337.asp
A forthcoming book by a couple of literary unknowns is about to get extraordinary publicity in the Microsoft Corp. antitrust trial

How pathetic is this, that they're obviously trying to put pro-MS articles in non relevant search results? ughhh I can't find anything on the web without getting a dick full of prop-o-ganda!

this story does NOT say tivo endorses this

[happystink]

The quote from Tivo is just saying that people WILL do this. They are not saying it's okay with them. I don't even really get that inference. The SINGLE QUOTE in question is so so so neutral.

It's annoying when posters don't read the story, but when slashdot editors don't, it's just sad.

sig:

Re:two things

[iCEBaLM]

More to the point: if a company rents out equipment with GPL-modified equipment (rather than sells it), would they need to release the code modifications?

Yes, read the GPL, it says it in plain black and white that if you distribute GPL derrived works you must also offer source. Renting is a form of distribution for a set amount of time.

-- iCEBaLM

Re:Why is this news?

[Skim123]

Maybe I am not a big enough geek, but I don't see why this is /. worthy. Assume for the moment that TiVo did have an anti-hacking rule... ok, don't buy TiVos... there's no reason to buy one and then bitch about it. Oh well....

Re:Questions about TiVo

[JAB2611]

The download format of TiVo's guide data download is not open. It is proprietary. If someone were to crack this and start offering a competing server for TiVo's existing clients, TiVo would surely respond with increased security; subscription revenue is the only way they get a return on writing the client software.

In the US, programs usually start on time, although there are notable exceptions. Version 2.0 of the TiVo software will allow you to specify an automatic pre and post padding to recordings of programs, i.e. always start recording X-Files one minute early and end one minute late.

The networks don't give TiVo any information about advertisements, but TiVo really doesn't need this information. It records the ads and then allows you to fast-forward through them at up to 60x. When you exit FF, it does an automatic skip-back to compensate for your reaction time, usually leaving you within a few seconds of where you wanted to be.

Stripping ads automatically poses two problems. (1) Ad stripping isn't 100% accurate, so you'd likely miss some of your program; (2) the networks would sue them.

/jab

Moderator - TiVo Community Help Center at http://www.tivocommunity.com

Why is this news?

[Skim123]

Buy a TiVo, you are paying your own money... you decide to tinker with it... why would the TiVo folks have any say in the matter? Don't you buy a TiVo? You aren't renting it, correct? I don't see why TiVo would have any stance on this. It would be like Ford saying, "We don't have any problem with people changing their own oil filters." That being said, why again is this news?

Re:Why is this news?

[Skim123]

Ignore these customers and state "We don't fix modified Fords" to stop people sending modified units back, incurring the wrath of the customer base

But if the warranty expressedly states, "Modifying the engine will void the warranty," then this is exactly what Ford should do. Those upset users should be upset at themselves for breaking their own car. Sheesh. This isn't a problem with other things in life... Correct me if I'm wrong, but Apple voids the warranty if you crack the case and tinker with it (and you are not one of their certified technicians). I've never seen a C!Net article reading, "Apple gives the OK to tinker with Apples, but the warranty will be voided," and I've never seen a /. article on said unseen C!Net article.

Re:Why is this news?

[WNight]

I'd be pissed if Ford voided my whole warranty because I made a change to a specific part of the car... If I change the engine and then take it in for bodywork, the warranty should still apply. But if they don't support the engine, that's no problem with me, I wouldn't switch engines without being able to fix it or having a mechanic who would. And it's not a Ford part, I wouldn't expect otherwise.

Actually, there are consumer protection laws in a lot of places about what warranties can be voided because of... For instance, a clause saying you can't open your PC without voiding the warranty... it's not valid. Your PC is consumer repairable, that's the way PCs are, so they can't void your warranty for using it the way you're supposed to. It'd be like Ford voiding the whole warranty because you repainted.

For a TiVo, which isn't a user-modifiable part (the power supply isn't shielded, etc) I can see them voiding the whole hardware warranty.

But I'd sue them if they wrote a patch in the next software release to test for certain drive serial #s only and die on modified units...

Re:Why is this news?

[Oxryly]

They do provide with a service (which you must pay for) after you purchase the TiVo unit.

AFAIK, the TiVo is fairly useless without that service, so: if they suspend the service for hacking your TiVo to add a second hard drive, there's really not much use in hacking it *and* the /. community has another evil corporation to hate for removing the user's right to tamper with their unit.

Thus the view that this story is /. news.

Oxryly

Great but...

[emgeemg]

Isn't it somewhat disheartening that a company has to come out and publicly give their blessing for people to tinker with what they own? Yes, I know Tivo couldn't stop people from hacking up their products even if they were so inclined, but this should be implicit. If you bought it, you own it and can do whatever the hell you want to it and no company anywhere or anytime should be able to say anything about it except that you've voided the warranty.

Re:two things

[drix]

A cursory glance at their website reveals that they distribute the source to the kernel they are running, which is modified. However the real bread-and-butter of the TiVo (their proprietary filesystem and, most importantly, their client software) is closed and will be forever and ever. You seem to be hinting at a GPL violation but if you read the GPL license more closely you'll see that they are in total compliance.

--

Re:Well, DUH!

[ncc74656]

Speaking of warranties and that sticker, I just snagged a TiVo (the 14-hour Philips model) a little bit ago (someone in the other recent TiVo thread mentioned that these were $200 after rebate at a certain electronics retailer). The back of the box has one of those "warranty void if removed" stickers on it. I thought it was going to be like those stickers I used to see on Packard Bells and such that left behind a silvery "VOID" when you removed it. However, the sticker actually came off pretty cleanly. If you open the case slowly enough, you can remove the sticker in one piece and put it back if you have to take the box in for service. Nothing will look amiss. You could probably even stick the sticker on some wax paper to keep it fresh, so that if you're constantly monkeying with the box, you won't have to continuallly remove/replace the sticker. I don't have a second drive to install in it right now (the drive that's in the TiVo is bigger than any of the drives in any of my computers :-) ), but I wanted to make a "virginal" backup of what's on the drive...the TiVo hacking FAQ sez this is a good idea if the thought of running afoul of warranties doesn't scare you too much, as it'll be the smallest backup possible.

_/_
/ v \
(IIGS( Scott Alfter (remove Voyager's hull # to send mail)
\_^_/

Good news, but is it surprising?

[Transition Cat]

I mean, why would Tivo be opposed to this?

• These small minority of Tivo owners are voiding their warranties (good news to Tivo since they won't have to fix the unit even if it would have broken on its own).
• The modified units are still being used for their intended purposes.
• Any quasi-illegal hacks and improvements designed by d0m357|c h4x0r5 such as making the Tivo an mp3 box can be reverse engineered later by Tivo themselves without any patent violations or R&D costs.
• Where's the downside?

....