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Time Warner to Allow Digital Recording
platypussrex writes "CNN is reporting that some Time Warner cable customers will be offered the ability to use digital recording. The article says they will not have a commercial zapping feature but even the use of digital recording seems a major turn-around from what the entertainment industry has been saying so far. I wonder if this will help TiVo and ReplyTV gain 'legitimacy'?"
Two FPs.
CliT.
The
acs rockkkkk
this early post is for hamburgers, because I'm about to go get one.
--
the strongest word is still the word "free"
take this!
I hope they do a box with DVR and HD. I love my High Def cable box, much easier than an antenna, but I miss not being able to use my TiVo with it.
I can't build a box either. No one makes an HDTV PC card with a component INPUT, they are all Antenna input.
time warner sees the upside potential of selling hardware, every other content provider will feel threatened
Someone else gets the post AFTER I submitted the exact same post almost an hour ago.
TW is thoughtfully leaving out one feature: Ad skipping.
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
To let me continue the enjoyment of my fair-use rights. How nice of them to see the huge public outcry that would have happened if they tried to Macrovision everything.
As Robin Williams said Sunday night "You've got mail, hope you don't have stock."
B
Flamebait
Serious inquiries only.
Credits: anonymous
"Mmmm... this feels good..." I sighed.
"Shhh!" hissed Hemos. "We don't want Mark to come in here!"
True. Having Hemos's 16 year-old brother walk in on us at that moment would not be good. I didn't think he'd be too cool with finding his 12 year-old brother lying naked with me, holding my 11 year-old dick in his hands. But, in all fairness, my hands were eagerly playing with Hemos's dick and balls at that moment, too.
Hemos's mom and dad had gone to the drive-in, leaving his big brother in charge. In our favor, leaving Mark in charge pretty much guaranteed that we weren't to bother him, and in turn, he'd leave us alone unless we were making too much noise or breaking something. Well, we were being careful to keep quiet because we very much wanted to be left alone.
We were in Hemos's twin bed, snuggled under the covers with our underwear pushed down to the foot of the bed. The only illumination in the room came from the faint sliver of light that crept in under his bedroom door. Even in the shadows I could make out the shape of my friend; about my height, but heavier. (Hell, I was such a skinny runt that everyone was heavier than me.) Hemos had a crew-cut of white-blonde hair, and was only starting to sprout some pubic hair. But, you had to feel for it because what little pubic hair he possessed was as blonde as the short hair on his hea and could not yet be seen by even a minimal distance.
And, I was happily feeling for it, running my hands all over Hemos's slightly larger erection and fondling his larger testicles while he courteously stroked my dick. I could tell that he didn't possess the same enthusiasm for cockplay as I did, unless you count his appreciation for the attention devoted to his member. And I knew that my willingness to satisfy his sexual urges was one of the few reasons he even had me sleep over at his place. But, I didn't let that stop me from finding pleasure in the handling of his meat.
I'd recently had an "introduction", of sorts, to seeing what someone could do with a man's dick with their mouth. While spending the night with my Uncle Jerry a couple weeks before, while I watched in secret, I was treated to a visual display of the intensity and unabashed pleasure that my uncle had obviously enjoyed having another man suck on his cock. From that moment on, I had a yearning that I needed to satisfy. With who was my only question.
I guess it was time to find out.
"I... heard that sucking on it feels even better than playing with it." I ventured.
In the darkness, I could feel a slight jerk of revulsion in Hemos's body.
"Put a dick in your mouth?" he croaked.
"Well, " I countered, my heart pounding with anxiety, "I think adults do it all the time."
"Well, I'm not gonna do it!" Hemos hissed. "That's homo stuff!"
"Yeah." I sighed disappointedly, while still playing with Hemos's dick. "I guess it is."
As I stroked his shaft in a steadier, milking rhythm, I could sense Hemos's breaths getting quicker. His manipulations of my dick began to falter as I could feel his body tense beside me. His hips rocked slightly in time with my pumping of his cock, and I cradled his balls tenderly in my other hand. When any attentions to my own dick has completely ebbed, I knew what was about to happen, so I picked up the pace just a bit more while lending a touch more pressure in my grip. Finally, Hemos's breath caught in his throat, and he turned his face fully into his pillow to stifle the moans that broke free as his cock pulsed and throbbed in a dry orgasm within my hands. I continued to massage him and didn't release him from my grasp until his member had gone fully soft.
"Man," sighed Hemos dreamily after finally catching his breath. "You are so good at that, CmdrTaco."
At least I had something to be proud of, I guess, as my friend gently withdrew himself from me and rolled onto his back.
Even though I was only eleven, the irony of Hemos's words and actions were not lost on me. My sucking on him would have been a "homo" thing, but beating him off was okay. Go figure. Within the few moments I had spent mulling over the irony of the thoughts, Hemos had drifted off to sleep. I slipped out from under the covers and down to the cool floor so I could masturbate without shaking the bed. As I toyed with my own dick, I imagined Hemos's cock in my mouth, wondering if the chance would ever really come. Finally, my own climax washed over me, and I got back into the bed.
I don't sleep real well to begin with, and even worse when I'm not in my own bed. And now, with the thoughts of a dick so close to me, as well as the vivid memories of secretly seeing man-to-man cocksucking pleasure floating through my prepubescent, sex-filled brain, I was not about to fall asleep anytime soon. Lying awake until around 11:30, I finally decided that I needed to do something to satisfy my hungers, or I'd never be able to let it rest. The trick was in finding the guts to follow through.
I knew that whenever Hemos fell asleep, he pretty much stayed asleep. So, since he was sleeping soundly, lying on his back, I took a deep breath and gingerly ducked my head under the covers and scooted down as much as I could to the foot of the bed. That put my head right at Hemos's hip level. I raised my head and upper body to help create a tent over his crotch. Sniffing around, I found the faint scent of young penis flesh. I inhaled deeply, both in the love of the scent, and in an attempt to slow my pounding heart. I opened my mouth wide over the area where I sensed Hemos's dick to be, and lowered my mouth squarely over his soft cock and balls until I could feel his sparse pubic hairs tickling my cheek. I finally had a dick in my mouth! I just wasn't sure what I'd do if Hemos woke to find his "homo" friend in this situation.
I remained like that for a long moment, partially in fear of trying anything more, and partly to savor the moment. I carefully let my tongue start to explore his tender penile flesh, enjoying the texture. Then came the excitement that welled within me as his cock began to respond to my attentions and harden in my warm and wet mouth! Butterflies seemed to explode in my stomach and drown out my heartbeat as I felt his dick get to its full size in my mouth. Concentrating in that dark environment, I found myself beginning to identify the shape of his member by taste. The shaft actually seemed to taste different than the head, and the thin skin of his scrotum seemed to harbor another distinct flavor.
I started to softly suck on Hemos's dick, becoming fascinated at how it just seemed to, well, 'fit' in my mouth... how the head lent itself to the back of my tongue, and how the shaft rested between my tongue and the roof of my mouth. My excitement was so great that my own recently satisfied dick was responding again, inviting me to play. I was sucking a cock, and I was in heaven!
However, within seconds, Hemos seemed to get restless. In fear, I quickly pulled my mouth away from Hemos's candy stick and held still. The covers rustled, and pulled back.
"Whatcha doin'?" mumbled Hemos.
"I... uh... was trying to find my shorts down here," I lied, starting to fumble near our feet. Well, partial lie, because it was a good idea to do so, anyway, and now was as good a time as any.
"Oh, yeah," said Hemos. "Get mine, too, willya?"
"S-sure" I stammered, relieved.
I located the two items of clothing and scooted back up towards the head of the bed. Thankfully, our underwear were pretty easy to distinguish since Hemos wore boxers, and I wore briefs. We both fumbled to put them on in the dark, and then settled back into the bed. I lay stiffly on my back, still harboring some fear that my friend discovered more than he let on, but Hemos simply rolled onto his side, facing away from me, and promptly went back to sleep.
And, here I was again, so close to my fantasies, yet still so far.
And very much awake.
After hearing the clock in the hallway chime midnight, I finally got up to go to the bathroom. Figuring it was late enough not to be an issue, and since even if Hemos's parents were home that they would be in their own bedroom downstairs, I didn't bother to slip on my pants for the short trip down the hall. I walked softly to the bedroom door, and then stepped out into the hallway, illuminated dimly by a bare-bulb night light. I walked past big brother Mark's door to the bathroom at the end of the hall and turned on the light as I shut the door.
Peeing into the toilet, I looked up at my reflection in the large mirror and smiled slyly to myself. I actually sucked on a dick, even if for only a moment! At that moment I was Rob Maldo, secret agent double-O-seven, who could sneak in and suck a dick, and sneak away without being caught!
I flushed the toilet and switched out the light as I headed back down the hall. Slipping past Mark's door once again, the door flew open, and a hand covered my mouth while a muscular arm snapped around my waist and drew me into the room. Squirming in the arms of Hemos's athletic older brother was a waste of effort, and he only squeezed harder until I settled down.
"You'll keep quiet if you know what's good for you,' growled Mark into my ear. "You gonna be quiet?"
I nodded. Mark let go of my mouth and reached over to close his bedroom door, the other hand and arm still holding me firmly with my feet off the ground. I heard something click, and recalled, and not without a certain amount of childish fear, that Mark had a lock on his door.
The room had a yellowish glow from the large lava lamp next to Mark's bed. He took me over to the bed and tossed me face down onto it, kneeling next to me. I thought briefly about trying to get up and run, but to where?
When I felt Mark's hands on me again, I was determined to fight him off, but I was no match for him as he flipped me onto my back and straddled me, sitting squarely on my upper chest, his knees pinning my shoulders and my arms locked between his legs. I gazed up at his lean, muscled torso, his stern blue eyes under a tussled mane of reddish-blonde hair. I could feel the soft fabric of his boxers against my chin.
"Can't get up, can ya?" he said, grinning down at me, all snide and victorious.
I struggled a bit, more out of obligation, but knew it was no use. Mark was just too big for me.
"Whatsamatter?" huffed Mark. "You too weak to fight? Or, maybe you just like laying there, sniffing dicks?"
I started squirming a bit harder, but Mark's legs only clamped tighter. At least he had scooted down a bit, and was no longer suffocating me with his weight on my chest.
"Yeah! Maybe you're a homo-boy who just likes sniffing dicks. Maybe you wanna sniff my big dick?"
I didn't care for where this was going, and I wasn't too comfortable with the tone of Mark's voice. But, I was also not being given much of a choice in the matter. Especially when Mark reached into the fly of his boxers and pulled out his cock.
"Here you are, homo-boy... a nice, fresh big-man dick!" grinned Mark fiendishly. "Ain't it a beaut?"
He held it out for me, then leaned forward and started to rub his cock on my face, tracing my cheeks and nose with the bulbous head. His testicles soon followed his dick through the opening, until they were dangling on my chin, the coarse pubes tickling my lips. Their faint musky scent began to fill my nostrils.
"CmdrTaco's just a little dick-faced homo-boy, ain't he?" sneered Mark, sliding his cock across my face. "I saw you in there, your head under the covers. What were you doing? Giving my little brother a blow job?"
I didn't answer. I was at once shocked at the thought of having been discovered, and confused by Mark's remark. I then guessed that he meant sucking a dick was called a 'blow job'. But... you're not blowing, you're sucking, and-
"You were, weren't you, you little homo!"
It was obvious what had happened; that Mark had looked in on us to find my head under the blankets. I thought I had sensed a miniscule change in the light, but assumed that to be part of my excitement. That must have been what woke Hemos up so suddenly.
"So, maybe you aren't just dick-faced, " he said, rubbing his cock on my face again. "Maybe you're a dick sucker!" He leaned forward, mashing his hairy ball sack into my nose, then pulling back to trace my features again with his member. But, even as Mark taunted me, treating his cock as a threatening weapon, there was something else happening.
He was getting a boner.
And as I closed my eyes, I could feel his cock thickening against my face. I could sense the heat of his hardening dick directly on my flesh. And, I found I was enjoying the sensations of this older cock against my face. There would soon be no way of hiding the fact that I was getting excited, too.
"So, dick-sucker-CmdrTaco... you're gonna suck my dick, now."
My eyes sprung open to see Mark's fully erect cock pointing at my face. While it wasn't huge (I had already seen 'huge' with my Uncle Jerry), it was still big enough to scare me.
And excite me to no end.
"Open wide, homo-boy."
Without another moment of hesitation, or taking my eyes off of Mark's sleek tool, I opened my mouth as wide as I could and watched as he leaned down and slid that beautiful cock into my waiting mouth. I then settled my tongue against the bottom half of his shaft while I could feel the upper half press against the roof of my mouth. Its texture was soft, yet hard; smooth, yet distinct.
"There," he sighed. "Now, you have a real dick to suck on. Now, get started, suck-boy!"
It was so much bigger than Hemos's young dick, I wasn't sure if I could get enough suction worked up to suck on it. It was then that I found out what sucking a cock is really all about: friction.
Mark held the base of his dick to guide himself and started to pump into my mouth, sliding his dick in and out of my salivating lips. He would slip in precariously between my teeth until he was near to choke me, then pull back out until the base of the bulbous head was just close to popping free from my lips, held in place by the suction of my mouth. Then he... we... would do it all over again... over and over... and gloriously over again.
"Oh, you are good, CmdrTaco," he moaned softly. "You suck cock real good."
I don't know about that; it seemed he was doing all the real work. But, I wanted it to be good. I wanted to have this dick in my mouth. And I wanted it again and again. I was definitely enjoying the oral sensations as his near-adult dick worked back and forth in my hungry mouth, and I wanted so much to please him so he would want my mouth again.
Mark placed his other hand on the top of my head to steady me as his thrusts became a little more erratic. His breath quickened, and I could sense that he was trying hard not to ram himself all the way down my throat and choke me. He was making little grunts with each thrust, and I could feel his dick turn to stone in my mouth when, in a mix of fear and excitement, I suddenly recalled what would happen next.
"Oh, baby... oh, fuck..."
Mark's movements got all quick and jerky. I was almost afraid to breathe.
"OHHHH!!!" he moaned, pulling out of my mouth and letting loose with a burst of white goo that seemed to splatter all over as he pumped his dick with his fist. My head still held firmly in his other hand, the warm liquid flew partly into my still open mouth, and all over my nose and eyebrows. I swallowed briefly, not sure whether to gag or hope for more, tasting fully the salty and musky liquid, then opened my mouth once more as Mark stuck his creaming cock back in and worked the thick fluid throughout my young mouth.
I sucked until Mark went soft and withdrew his spent dick. He smiled down at me, obviously proud of what he had done. He finally got off of me (good thing since I thought my arms were going to fall off) and stood there for a moment, an interesting picture with his hands on his hips, and his drained cock and balls hanging out of the fly of his plaid boxers. I just lay there with his juices clinging to my skin, wanting to do it all over again.
Mark bent down and picked up a t-shirt, and proceeded to wipe the remainder of his goo off my face. Finished with that, he tossed the shirt into a hamper and walked over to his bedroom door to unlock it as he tucked his manhood back into his underwear.
"You better get back into Hemos's bed before mom and dad find you here," he said softly.
I reluctantly got off Mark's bed and walked to the door. As I was about to exit, he reached out to stop me briefly.
"You liked that, didn't you, homo-boy?"
I nodded, not sure where he was going with this inquiry.
"Your first taste of cum?"
I shrugged, then nodded again.
"If you're good, maybe I'll let you suck my dick again some time, CmdrTaco. Now, get your ass out of here before I kick it."
I stepped out of the room and felt the door close harshly behind me. I could still taste traces of Mark's cum in my mouth, could still sense the friction of his cock on my tongue. I smiled in remembrance.
I was hooked.
- posted by poopbot: because we're all crapflooders at heart
e7sI7uBs3y Post #273
Instead of fighting the inevidable, release your own consumer friendly product that does NOT affect your revenue in a negative way. Then, there'd be little room (for the general public, anyway) for products that do offend your profits.
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
imagine a beowulf cluster of these!!!
all your base are belong to us!
i hate micro$oft!
Hey finally i have the right to do what i want with something i payed for. The freedom i have been given by ATT is just amazing. I am so glad they understand what it is to be an amaerican. Seriously i am glad ATT is "Letting" costumers do this, but they should never have had the right to complain about it in the first place. If i record a show and give it to my friend guess what i am a nice guy for taping there show. Down with ATT.
Dan Mayer: my blog, essays, art, etc
TV is so 20th century.
Je t'aime Stéphanie
I own a first generation Tivo. I couldn't imagine watching TV without it, it's become such an important part of my Television experience. I'm looking at ReplayTV's new unit which will allow me to send shows to other ReplayTV's (this will definately take some time to catch on). I'll be buying one of those. Now the Cable company is geting in on it, but they're leaving out lots of the features that make my Tivo and ReplayTv ultra convenient and consumer friendly... Oh yeah, I'm on that. It's a shame when companies lose sight of the consumer.
00101010
Subject is the message
I have wondered when the day will come that your television will just be another Internet appliance. Same with your radio -- crystal clear over tcp/ip instead of all the interference of FM or AM. The ability then to record, redistribute, share, etc., would be great. I think they have seen the pilot with products like Tivo. People that understand it love it. Those that don't, when shown the power, love it too.
Click here or here.
How long before this becomes a Time Warner targed advertising tool?
The box can easily compile a list of what you're watching, and then pop up advertising based on your viewing demographic.
Soon you'll see targed ads in your schedule gude, on the music channels. And the ultimate: popping up while you're playing back your program.
Why get this when you can just buy a Tivo system? Probably less cost in the long run, and a bigger HD...
Two words for ya :
bait
&
Switch
or hook the populace, then charge.
anyone want a nice jpeg?
OJNK
AT&T YOU WILL!
*8D-{
Bell ExpressVU satellite in Canada has had the 5100 model receiver out for about a year now I think. It has a build in PVR as well. Currently the only one available in Canada (the last I looked anyways). Everythings proprietary, so no hacking fun, but at least I get to have a digital recorder to playback TV at the same quality as live.
Place witty comment here.
Alright, I hope they make the according adjustments on there end, so that I can sit back and watch the MOD chips come in allowing people to skip commercials.
Might even be a few people with enough talent to turn the box into a TIVO for cheaper.
I wonder if this announcement will offset the news that they've become one of the latest corporations to come under review for shady accounting practices.
Can I bum a sig?
And when AOL/TW buys the Broadcast Flag from Congress, you may still be able to use their set-top box to record one or two shows a year! Groovy! ;-)
Imagine you just sat down to find your favorite program.
Now imagine you power up your digi-TV-recorder from Time Warner.
You slowly hit the "Guide" button to scan for your favorite program.
All of the sudden, it's there, right in front of you, an AD brought to you by Time Warner!! Sitting right there, next to your channel choices! As you scroll through the list, you can't help but want to run out and buy a Big Mac....large fries.....super-size coke.... They aren't doing this to compete with satellite...they're doing it to integrate advertising into the overlay screens.
Mordor...a magical, mythical land where women are more rare than dragons--but where every man would rather find a dragon
Well, in a limited fashion. TWC is rolling out iControl here in Central Florida. It's basically a Video-On-Demand service that allows for pause, rewind, and many other TiVo-like features, but apparently only for Pay-Per-View movies.
I've also noticed an HBO On Demand channel appear in my lineup in the past two weeks, with a "Coming Soon" label on it. The on-screen display for this channel indicates it'll be a repository where HBO subscribers can watch HBO-specific programming On Demand. I'll be interested to see if there's an added premium for this, and how far back they carry the catalog (It would be nice to catch up with the Sopranos or watch the full run of From the Earth to the Moon without having to buy the DVD sets).
At any rate, I had a tech come out to replace my burnt-out cable modem a few weeks ago (plenty of storms here on the Southeast Coast - hence my nickname), and he replaced my cable box with a new model by Scientific Atlanta. He said I'd need this when the iControl went live in the area. I haven't yet, but I guess when I get home I'll bust out the screwdriver and have a look-see what's inside the thing...
I wonder if this will help TiVo and ReplyTV gain 'legitimacy'?"
I wonder if it will help put them out of 'business'.
m00.
my question is , in tv today, and any other era of tv, i dont really see what is worth being taped, is there really anything worthwhile on tv nowadays that makes you a smarter, more intelectual, or promotes quality character traits? I dont know about you but the 3/4 of americans tuning in to watch "the real world" doesn't seem to be improving them in any way, but i'm sure that they would program their tv's to record it if they couldn't be home to watch it. Maybe its just me but i think that some technologies are only going to cause more kids to grow up and be worthless tv slobs. Go read a book, make new friends, try something you wouldn't normally try. Its sad that many people spend half their lives watching someone else's idea of how the world is portrayed, without ever actually interacting in it themselves. Those people are only gonna grow up to gawk about how hot that chick on tv was or if they watched the new Cribs episode. Personally i dont like carrying on conversations with people about tv personalities and their houses.
Righteousness postpones the inevitable
http://burningaureole.caveism.net
Call me paranoid, but if Time Warner begins taking over a significant portion of the PVR market, then wouldn't they have a means to implement whatever copy "protection" schemes they want? If they're manufacturing the hardware, they could very easily make it implement the whole "broadcast flag" idea, assuming they release a similar product for digital television. Just seems to me like this is an attempt to gain a foothold into a market so that they could further control content/copying later.
This is exactly what the record companies are trying with their doomed-to-fail mp3 portals. They will do a terrible job, so that they can go to the courts and say, "look, we tried, people don't want to do things the legal way" and have TiVo banned as a pirating tool that uses that terrorist hippie Lunix operating system.
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
Bigger drive, no onerous potential DRM issues, can use it with any channel/cable system, not just locked into a single companys. And of course, runs Linux ;-).
To me, the only advantage that these integrated boxes have is the ability to record digital MPEG-2 directly from the cable/satellite, without converting to and converting it back from analog and the loss. But guess what... the quality of the digital video stream is not all that great to begin with in most cases (the source signal is generally analog, passed through a real-time MPEG-2 encoder at the broadcasting facility, so it's not as good as say DVD) So quality loss is sort of negligle, IMO.
There's 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
Now that a major company like Time Warner is jumping on the digital recording bandwagon, perhaps it will gain some legitimacy. ;)
I guess I'll have to take TW off my list of capitalist, profit-hungry and closed-minded companies for now.
Well, at least they're proving to be open-minded... dono bout the other two
What's up, Doc?
and is already working in NE Wisconsin. Check out their webpage.
I wonder if this will help TiVo and ReplyTV gain 'legitimacy'?"
ReplyTV of course being the all-new super-special customer-oriented version of the new wave of pop-up ads for TV. These ads will not only let you know that the products you see during your favorite programming actually exist, but they will also let you interact with the ad. This new "feature" has been developed with the collaboration of major TV broadcasters and the makers of the X10 camera.
It doesn't record shows to hard drive. It just lets you pause and rewind. And they must be using some WMF format because the quality is worse than the worst setting on Tivo. It does not store video though.
It sounds great, but some key factors are missing!
First of all, they will NEVER allow you to make digital copies. Tell them you want to burn copies to DVD or a PC hard-drive and see how warm a response you get....there will be none from them!
They are allowing limited saving of shows. The limits are as big as the device's hard disk or maybe they will have other restrictions.
This is not a major victory. AOL/TW is behind Tivo, so it's no shock that they will over some similar features to cable customers.
This is OK, but don't get carried away with happiness. They still are not allowing people to make digital copies on removable media for personal use. Eventhough they save space and DVDs last longer than VCR tapes. Once DVD Burners become more common, they will probably ad some type of protection to prevent digital copies from being made to DVDs.
The entire VoD system that TW is building out requires the 'Digital Cable' service they sell.
The way the VoD controls work (They call it iControl) is that when you hit your 'pause' key, the receiver sends that command back upstream to the VoD server which pauses it there. There is a small delay (200ms or less), but it works.
The switchout of the cable box was probibly to facilitate the send/receive of the commands from your unit/remote.
iControl has been available here in the Albany, NY market for some time now... If only the pricing wan't a ripoff.
Privacy issues aside, why wouldn't you like targeted advertising? Instead of watching commercials for tampons, denture cream you will get the Dell adds and Cable Internet ads. We'll never get advertising-free TV, but at least it's advertising for products that you *may* actually buy!
The article says they will not have a commercial zapping feature but even the use of digital recording seems a major turn-around from what the entertainment industry has been saying so far.
So that is so nice of them to *not* "zap" my stuff.. Wow.. what new things can we expect? Maybe, they will allow us to "Pay" for stuff too.. Sheesh..
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
I am a TW cable employee (don't throw anything I am just an intern), and will be attending a session (4 hours for some reason) on this really soon.
I will say that they do know what the pricing is, and it will be rolled out in Greensboro, NC soon.
In addition, in case anyone cares. The whole system runs off a full rack of about 10 Sun servers... I can find out more info on those if anyone wants...
Tibbon
tibbon.com
Take from tivo.com:
"America Online (AOL), Advance/Newhouse, CBS, Comcast Corporation, Cox Communications, DIRECTV, Discovery Communications, Encore Media Group, Liberty Media subsidiaries, Liberty Digital, NBC, Philips Electronics, Showtime Networks, SONY, TV Guide Interactive and The Walt Disney Company -- leading companies from every facet of both the television and communications industries have embraced TiVo's concept of personal television and made equity investments in the company."
"Im drowning here, and you're describing the water!"
Last week, Jamie Kellner, chairman of Turner Broadcasting System, also owned by AOL Time Warner, said television viewers could face paying for channels they now receive at no cost if PVRs kill commercials.
Give me a break. The only advertising methods where reliable effectiveness measurements can be made are where the customer physically calls the vendor at an advertised number (or surfs to an advertised URL) within a given timeframe after an ad has been shown. Anything else is guesswork.
If TV execs and advertisers are going to use PVR penetration as their effectiveness metric, their view will definitely be flawed.
Perhaps if more ads were closed captioned, the ad auto-skip logic wouldn't automatically skip so many ads. Ads don't have to be integrated into the programming to defeat automation.
---- Politics: Kissing ass and pointing blames.
Sorry, that's been building up in me for some time now. :)
Al Qaeda has ninjas!
AT&T broadband has been mass mailing promotions encouraging customers to use a Tivo with theier service.
In Memphis. I have a couple friends that either work for TW or have a relative that does. They are testing this, to a degree. Except what they are testing does not require replacing their existing digital cable box.
Appearently the choices are stored at TW's facility. They are also testing HBO on demand. One of them said they could select say the current season of Sex in the City and they get a listing of all current episodes for this season.
The PVR like functionality is what intrigues me with them not having any kind of onsite hard drive in the box. When they press pause, it pauses instantly just like my Tivo.
> I wonder if this will help TiVo and ReplyTV gain 'legitimacy'?
This idea of a ReplyTV intrigues me. Would it allow me to let those moronic sitcom writers know how I feel about that horrible cliche they just used? Or perhaps I could bitchslap that vapid anchorman the next time he screws up a technology story?
Heck, an invention like this might get me watching TV again!
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
I'm sure this has been covered before, but what is the current state-of-the-art in building your own DVR box?
Specifically, if I want to go out and build myself a (pref. Linux-based) computer for DVR, what hardware/sofware solutions are out there that work now?
Record to hard drive, burn-to-VCD, burn-to-DivX;), burn-to-DVD, etc...
I am concerned about any program, any piece of hardware, any treaty, any law that treats me as a consumer, not a citizen
I can't help but feel I'm being trolled, but what the heck. ReplayTV is a DVR box pretty much just like Tivo; check out ReplayTV's web site for more info.
No, S-vid doesn't do HD. When I say antenna I mean HD over the air, not normal crappy antenna signal. Most people get HD content via antenna, but Time Warner carries it in some markets via digital cable. It's much easier than dealing with the antenna and I don't need to buy the $500 receiver box to sit between the TV and antenna.
Beware, Nugget is watching... See?
Alright, I see...you were making fun of the misspelling of "Replay" as "Reply". Never mind.
Since cable TV is a monopoly, you don't have the option of an alternate provider with less restrictive hardware. So, no commercial skips, no sharing TV across the internet, no recording PPV or premium content.
My guess is they'll make it pretty cheap (about as much as a TiVo subscription, and nothing up-front) in order to kill the retail PVR market. If there are no consumer-owned PVR's, there's no permissive PVR use problem.
--Dave
All this is to circumvent people from, "enchacing" thier channel lineups.
Don't mess with the stuff you have to give back to the cable co. (NowFree Mac Mini Yeah, it's
Despite being a happy tivo owner, I'm still tempted. I like the thought of being able to record the mpeg stream directly to get the best possible image quality. And it can do one thing the tivo can't - record Dolby Digital sound.
Some features I'd like to see:
- ability to extract the mpeg streams
- record to dvd+rw
Danny
I can find out more info on those if anyone wants...
The following would be truly appreciated:
1. What operating system does it run?
2. What kind of a HD and partition does it use? (Standard or propietary)
3. What other "special" devices are in it?
4. What specifically is propietary and what is standard parts?
5. What DRM management software is in it?
6. Is it automagically updatable?
7. What user usage data does it record?
and any other pertinent info too would be useful, I'm sure.
Actually, if you could just sneak out the information details, and scan them in, or get a monkey to type in, and submit a story to \., that would be truly appreciated.
Of course, I am in no way, shape, or form, encouraging a company IP theft. [Enter further appropriate disclaimer here.]
Seeing how everything is going into the internet stage I wonder what will be next? Hey maybe I will be able to check my email on the toaster, cool!
Since they might be giving more of what viewers want, the cynic in me tells me that they probably have some hidden motives. Maybe it is a way to increase income in view of weird accouting practices or to sell hidden hooks to viewers (a la Microsoft) for implementing restrictions (read: control) in the future.
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
I've got TW Digital cable in Columbus Ohio, and they've just recently started pitching their iControl system to us. Apparently it is a system that will allow us to pause and resume our PPV programming without missing anything. This is kinda nice in that I often use PPV instead of hitting blockbuster and sometimes have to leave the room during the movie for a minute.
As far as the digital recorder function goes, it sounds neat but I imagine that we will be charged extra for the privilege. In my case, I still have a VCR if there's something that I really want too see that badly, and I don't have any problems recording off of any of the digital TV channels. At any rate, I wouldn't be too concerned about there being a lack of a "Commercial Zapper" button in their digital recording service, so long as you can still manually hold down the Fast Fordward button like you can with an old-school VCR.
Now regarding the digital TV channels, I am not impressed with the quality. I have a relatively new TV that has excellent sharpness and clarity, but the picture when watching the digital channels doesn't look any better than the analog channels do on it. What's worse, I can often catch pixellation in action shots (usually sports), especially with (drum roll please) straight lines that run at a diagonal on the screen. I see this all the time when watching CART races on Speedvision (one of the digital channels) but I never see it when watching CART races on CBS (one of the analog channels).
More importantly, why am I paying for digial cable but only receiving the allegedly "sharper, clearer" digital signal on half of my channels? I know that it sounds odd, but all of the channels that were previously available on my analog cable package work as they had previously. All of the channels that only became available with digital service all have a 2-3 second delay before they are displayed while changing channels (it has to switch data streams with the mothership, I assume). This is annoying. If it weren't for Speedvision (I need my CART and F1 fix) I wouldn't even have bothered with digital service, nor would I recommend it for someone who doesn't need it for a specific channel like I did as TW's implementation is less than impressive.
You can't do it, can you? (Hey, neither can I: I probably watch 2x the television now that I have a tivo.)
sulli
RTFJ.
It comes with Digital Cable.... Been around for a few months. http://www.twcny.com/services/iControl/index.cfm?T hankYou=One
"iCONTROL puts the power of Video on Demand in your Digital Cable box.
No late night visits to the video store...no late fees...no tapes to return...no stress. Order the movie you want...ANYTIME!
ALWAYS IN Movies are always available.
Start a movie when you want.
Pause, Fast Forward & Rewind the movie with your Digital Cable remote control... without using the VCR.
Choose from a digital library featuring a wide selection of new releases and movie favorites.
All from the convenience of your own home.
Coming Summer 2002.
Watch our web site and the mail for official launch dates.
You need to have Digital Cable to get Video on Demand with iCONTROL "
Thorstein
I know the head buyer for my area's TW HQ, and a couple weeks ago he mentioned this, adding that the models they've narrowed it down to will mean about $5 a month to subscribers. Not too shabby at all, though I'd expect them to charge more like $10 because a lot of people would probably pay it.
Storm, is it the SA 8000 box? iControl has been advertised in Rochester, NY-- how much does it cost in Albany and Florida?
Probably not a NEW idea. The media companies are worried about losing revenue due to fewer people watching commercials. Tell me something, why do people skip through the commercials? Its very simple. THEY DON'T WANT TO WATCH THEM. Yet for some reason, there's a large demographic of people that watch the Superbowl ONLY for the commercials.
What it all rolls down to is this, people watch TV to be entertained. With exception of the Superbowl, commercial breaks are lulls in the entertainment experience. They're a necessary evil, and people are willing to tolerate them as long as they have to, but the second they have an option to skip through them, they don't hesitate.
The secret here, ladies and gentlemen, is to create commercials that are WORTH WATCHING. If your commercial is so entertaining that someone is willing to watch it rather than skip through it, then the entire "PVR commercial theft" issue gets thrown right out the window. If people looked forward to commercials, they would probably also be more interested in the products being advertised.
Seems that this idea might work for other industries as well. Take the music industry for instance. Produce less crap, and more people might buy the music, less money will be wasted on the so called 90% of the content that loses money, and everyone will be happy.
Or maybe I'm just out of my tree.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
Of AOLTW to "allow" their customers to do what the Supreme Court (Betamax case) has ruled they have every RIGHT to do...
Do we now have to go BEG megacorps for our Constitutional rights?
Corporatism != Free Market
This is not at odds with what T/W has expressed. From the article, it seems T/W will charge a fee for the service plus you will have to watch commercials.
Digital recording through their box will give them instant feedback on your viewing habits and allow them to sell directed avertising.
So lets recap. You pay T/W for cable TV, you pay T/W for the privilege to digitally record, advertisers pay T/W for data on your personal viewing habits. You still get the same old crappy TV shows and you still have to sit through commercials (you may even be getting targeted commercials).
Gee Alex, I'll take "fucked but not even kissed" for $500.
Very frequently the browser won't start up when I change to the HBO On Demand or iControl channel, which requires me to reboot the set-top box. No, that's not just turning the cable box on and off, that's getting off my seat and pulling the plug out of the back of the box, waiting for a bit, plugging it back in, and waiting for it to reboot.
Secondly, if you pause a movie or a show, and leave it paused for longer than 20 seconds, it assumes you want to stop the show and save where you are. It takes me longer than 20 seconds to go to my fridge, get a refill of popsicles (my one vice ), and get back to my favourite couch.
Thirdly, there are times when you try and restart a movie you've stopped and saved, and it doesn't resume where you left off. Instead, it starts from the beginning of the movie. Given that a pause while you go and take a piss will often put you in this situation, you're talking about ... ANNOYING!
Now, I will say, I do like my iControl and HBO On Demand. I just don't know whether their set-top boxes (or the software they have running on them) are going to be as friendly as the ones currently existing.
Envy my 5 digit Slashdot User ID!
On the rare occassion that I'm watching TV, the only commercials I look forward to are TV Land's Retromercials. I mean, let's face it, some of these commercials could be used for the current product they are trying to sell, like waffle syrup. How is Mrs. Butterworth's gonna get better?
I agree that most commercials are terrible. The only memorable commericals that stick in my mind are those Snicker's commercials where the football guy thinks he's Batman. Oh, and ALL the SNL commercials...they rule. Where can I buy a box of Quarry? "Better tasting 'cause it's mined."
help fill in hidden movie endings @ End of the Credits
... I'll tell you why:
Scientific Atlanta, the company that will be making these PVR's for TW, also makes some of TW's digital cable boxes, including the version I have which decodes the HDTV signals broadcast over their cable network.
I own a TiVo and love it!
However, the thing I am dying for is an integrated TimeWarner digital cable box with TiVo like abilities. Support for HDTV would definitely be a plus, but just having complete integration between my TW digital box and my PVR would be heaven, and the Scientific Atlanta box could make this a reality!
- The digital channels would not ever need to be decoded to analog until it's sent to my TV -- leading to better quality recordings. Right now, anything off a digital channel is being decoded, sent to TiVo in analog format S-Video, then re-encoded in MPEG format by TiVo, and later decoded for my TV.
- I would not need two digital boxes (one for TiVo, one to watch live TV).
- The current TimeWarner digital TV navigation blows away TiVo's live TV navigation system. I'd love to be able to use it again with my PVR!
- They could include two decoders, like in the DirecTiVo box, so that I can record two programs at once... after all, most channels are already encoded digitally, the hard work is done.
- They could integrate HDTV! (A killer app, AFAIAC.)
Since AOL owns a percentage of TiVo, I won't be surprised if Scientific Atlanta licenses TiVo technology for the box (one can hope!).
"And like that
Paint me a cynic, but....
What would be the ultimate prize in digital recording? Hint, its already being used in major league baseball, certain New Years broadcasts, and other televised events. Give up? I'm talking about Dynamic Advertising!
Let me put on my Content Distributor Cap... I can already charge advertising dollars for commercial space in the original broadcast... but what if I can REPLACE the advertising space on a recording with NEW advertising based on when the recording was watched?
I can charge prime-time advertising costs to those companies who want their adverts in the "live" version, then I can charge a second rate for the "replay" version... or even tailor the commercials to trigger on time of day. Watching that horror movie at 10PM? Why not throw in a few ice cream commercials...
There are possibilities for people to make a lot of money out there...
Cable's answers to satellite...
High Def - 'Sure, its coming soon'
100% Digital - 'Sure, its coming soon'
Dobly Digital - 'Sure, its coming soon'
The cable channel you really want to watch - 'Sure, its coming soon'
NFL Sunday Ticket - 'Sure, its coming soon'
PVR - 'Sure its coming soon'
It's called DirecTV with a DirecTivo unit.
I can even fast foward through the commercials.
What's the big announcement here again?
The link you gave requires a login. Try this instead:
u b_PVR.htm
http://www.scientificatlanta.com/customers/prod_s
"And like that
It's another form of Video on Demand. You aren't going to get a hard drive at home. The items you tape will be stored on TW's servers, and you'll be able to call them back. It's the death of TIVO/SonicBlue/Replay when it catches on. I know other cable guys are looking at it. They say since most consumers have trouble setting up a VCR, the only way to get time shifting to mass adoption is to take the tech out of the home and make it esy to use. Of course, making sure you don't share/store/skip things aini't bad either. And targeted ads will be completely real.
When the investors lose faith, that should be a message to the Chief Officers that they're not making the right decisions.[AOLTW stock slid from $60/share (Sep) to its current level of ~$12/share.]
They haven't been making good decisions, and the stock price represents that. AOLTW got too big, too bloated, and too undefined in its corporate mission to be competitive.
Now we have TW's PVR. It's not actually as useful as Tivo or ReplayTV but it comes with your cable service, it'll no doubt be marketted as a nice and cheap add on, so most people'll go with it rather than Tivo or ReplayTV. It also won't actually allow commercial skipping, or file sharing, or anything else Time Warner didn't like before hand.
So, what we're really seeing is them using their market position to force the suppliers of a product that they don't like out of the market. What are the odds that TW's real plan is that, in another five years, TiVo and ReplayTV will have all but pulled out of the market and the Time Warner PVR will force you to keep watching those ads. Even better, as you have to watch your TV through it, they'll be able to stop you channel surfing too.
Forgive me if I don't see this as an amazing U-turn from Time Warner, nor the beginning of their acceptance of PVRs (as we currently know them).
6. Is it automagically updatable? 6b. Do you have to pay a premium for the gnomes to perform the automagical update? :)
Mordor...a magical, mythical land where women are more rare than dragons--but where every man would rather find a dragon
If it's anything like Dish's PVR system, you pay out the arse for the PVR-equipped reciever, then you must pay every month for them to turn the feature on. If you don't subscribe to the feature, you don't record or watch what you've already recorded.
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
"I wonder if this will help TiVo and ReplyTV gain 'legitimacy'?"
ReplyTV? Does this mean I can send the networks their shitty sitcoms back to them?
"I think you guys with quotes in your signatures should go have an original thought." -- Dan Miller
DSS receiver boxes have been sold with TiVo and UltimateTV hardware for quite some time now.
Once again the cable television industry is doing too little, too late to keep from losing yet more customers to digital satellite...
Sorry, no proprietary details, but the box specs are publicly available from Scientific-Atlanta
I've tried iControl twice on the free 'preview' programming, but each time the digital cable box crashed (brzaa) just after I selectted 'confirm order'.
I wouldn't want to get ripped off by that happening when I'm ordering something that results in a charge on the bill, so I'm not using it. It's too expensive anyway.
--- Hindsight is 20/20, but walking backwards is not the answer.
I have Time Warner, iControl, and HBO On Demand in Austin, TX. The software is really slow and a bit flaky. (When I stop a movie and then resume it, many times it resumes playing from the beginning of the movie, not from where I stopped it.)
But I'm guessing this has nothing to do with the PVR that TW is planning to roll out.
have they in fact instituted a per person comment cap ?
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
The service is called iControl. They are about to premire the service here in Central New York.
This isn't new. Sky in the UK has been offering this feature for at least 6 months with something called Sky+.
Nothing new about that!
I have an ANALOG tv with ANALOG cable.
Most ANALOG cable sends Guide+ info. My TV is capable of receiving that info. I automatically have a schedule inside the memory of my TV that contains all programming info.
It even has space for an ad, which gets downloaded. I was damn freaked out to see a commercial there. But it is kind of cool that my analog TV is capable of downloading images.
So... pressing Guide and seeing an AOL/Time Warner ad is not a new idea. It's already being done.
Not that this has much to do with the original topic, but I thought it merited mention.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
I'm working on the CNN Digital Archive project and I believe that this digital recording technology is being developed to support this project, but I also heard that they are definately planning to lease out as much of this technology to make up for the enormous R&D and equipment costs that I'm seeing dumped into this project.
This story is at leat 2 years old. The box will be a custom Tivo called AOLTV. See the (old) story here.
A 1000 hour TiVo is 1000 time more convenient than
a DVD player or a PC.
What kind of couch potato wants to get up and
search through a stack of little plastic disks?
Pick a show from the now playing list then sit back and veg.
"What's green on your Tivo?"