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AOL's Mystro TV vs Tivo?
admiral2001 writes "Here is is a NYTimes story about AOL-Time-Warner's plans for a TiVo-killing 'Mystro TV' (nytimes annoying free registration required). They plan to begin rolling this out sometime in the next two years. Their major features are the simple pause, rewind, and fast forward that all PVRs have. However, they've taken the obvious stance to "let[s] networks set the parameters, dictating which shows users can reschedule, and it also creates ways for networks to insert commercials." The article even mentions how they could get an advantage in pushing their product because "viewers could try out Mystro TV by pushing a button on their remote"."
Whats the point if i cant skip commercials? If the network decides what i can watch? I mean, hasnt the network already shown it at the wrong time, thats why im recording it!
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Getting the legions of Tivo owners to give up the system they have become so rabidly fond of. It's not just a product, it's a culture.
Getting an industry behind you won't help that much either. You could probably get bunches of AOL people who are on the fence about a Tivo purchase but anyone who owns a Tivo probably wouldn't jump at the chance to start receiving commercials.
The whole appeal of Tivo is that the watcher can take back control of watching TV. That is what makes Tivo a "killer app."
This reigns back in that control. That being the case, it is not the "killer app" TWC hopes it will be.
-Pete
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People will buy the gadget with better functionality built into it (ie. TIVO/Replay) given the choice and the knowledge.
They can hope that people will be stupid enough to shell out money for crippled hardware, but DivX (the original crippled DVD competitor) shows how well that works.
Why does evreything have to be a "insert current dominant player"-killer? Is Microsoft's business model doing that so pervasive that we don't see any other option? If the market will only support one company's product, is it really worth spending the time and effort to get into an existing market?
This is good for ReplayTV and TiVo. Very few people will avoid buying one of their units because the new service is available. Just the opposite--more consumers will be exposed to just how much more control they can have over their TV viewing. And once people see how much better it can be, they'll be more receptive to getting a ReplayTV or TiVo, because they'll understand why they want one (because the restricitions on the AOL service will be annoying).
I've seen the cable on demand functionality of "Cablevisions - Digital IO" service and it blew me away. You could watch whatever whenever. I think that this AOL-TW product will be dwarfed by on demand broadcasting. I'm waiting for the day when television will shift from broadcasting on a set schedule, to allowing the viewers freedom to choose what to watch, and when.
Imagine sitting down at 4AM and throwing on the news. It of course would not be live, but who cares. If you can watch it then, then great.
I do own a Tivo, and my TV watching has changed drastically. Unfortunately though, if its 7:30PM on a Sunday and I want to watch the new Simpsons episode at 8:00, I still have to wait. Imagine a system like this:
The channel decides which shows will "air" in a given week, and the viewer has access to ALL of them, at any time. If it's Monday and I want to watch something that typically airs on Friday, no problem. The only caveat with this, is live television. And you know what, if the live broadcast is that good, people will tune in at that time too.
I do see some reasons why I will still keep my Tivo:
"Or one household might see a commercial for a luxury car while another sees a pitch for an economy model. 'Increase the effectiveness of advertising by sending different ads to different homes,' the demonstration promises."
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The future of movies and television seems to be changing towards one that is advert-free but sponsored by product placement. Given that content is becoming plastic - copied and manipulated as wanted - this seems the only way to pay for films that people want to watch.
A recent film made in Africa - where copying is rife and people are poor anyhow - demonstrates this wonderfully. Critical Assignment, paid for by Guiness, is a kind of African James Bond action film with sexy women and a cheesy plot. The hero is Michael Power, already famous as the kung-fu kicking hero of Guiness adverts across Nigeria and other countries. I've driven past a huge poster of him in Lagos many times.
While businesses like AOL and Sony are worrying about how to (a) keep their customers and (b) make money from movies and (c) prevent piracy, other more pragmatic businesses are thinking: "piracy is inevitable, so let's use that to our advantage".
To be honest, films like Critical Assignment (which I've not seen, just read about) are probably really bad, but then many commercial efforts are as well. And as competition for viewers heats up (when Guiness's competitors, like South African Breweries and Heineken make their own action movies), quality will go up (or down, if you like).
I think the US/Japanese/Western content industry is too old and inflexible to understand how to use the new digital economy usefully. Expect the next Hollywoods to be in South Africa, Bombay, and Hong Kong, catering for audiences that number in the billion range.
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And this is not AOL's doing. This is the Time Warner end of the business. Why not just use TiVo in their set top boxes instead of wasting more money that AOL TW should be using to pay down its debt? This is borderline schitsophrenia (sic) because AOL itself owns 13% of Tivo stock. TiVo is going to be the standard PVR. Replay is bankrupt and still being sued by the whole broadcast industry. Time Warner Cable is idiotic. Why waste thousands of dollars per subscriber to run VOD when a PVR settop box is far more economical? Why would I pay $10 per month to watch the Sopranos any time I want when $14 per month to Tivo allows me to record any show I want to watch and view it at any time? Its just like that lame PVR Time Warner Cable currently offers from Scientific Atlantic. AOL TW should take the development money they are wasting on this and pump it into developing a dual tuner Tivo that is compatible with their cable networks? It makes the most sense and that's why they won't do it. At the same time, AOL is offering a Beta program for AOL subscribers who already own TiVo Series2 units to allow for online scheduling through your AOL account...as well as running AIM on top of network enabled Tivos. Where is the synergy supposed to be? If you ask me, its not AOL that's the problem, its the simpletons at Time Warner. You know, the same lugheads that greenlit "Battlefield Earth" and "Pluto Nash" which combined cost $200 million to make &that's not even factoring in the marketing costs. Way to go you idiots! Now just get it over with and cast Josh Harnett as Superman... Tools...absolute tools.
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I still can't figure out why Tivo is more popular than ReplayTV. I bought my Replay last weekend and it has soooo many more features than Tivo. My personal favorites are the ability to send shows to other Replay owners and the ability to program it online.
Every time I hear about Hollywood not liking TiVo, I don't get it. There are so many possibilities at thier disposal with this "technology". If they want to pilot a new program, why take from precious prime-time until you know it works? Schedule it for the cheapest time of day(or night), set the PVR's with viewer's who are likely to want to see it to record it, then go! (Just don't do that BBC thing where the user can't delete it.) Start taking commercial stats. Is a user fast-forwarding all commercials or just some? I know personally I enjoy some commercials (such as the miller one... "A ... walks into a bar"). If I skip through tampon comercials, it means one of four things: 1) I have no need to buy a tampon. 2) I'm already brand sold. 3) I've seen that commercial so many times I want to scream. 4) That commercial grates at me so bad I want to stop watching TV forever (such as the Old Navy commercials).
Now personaly, I really don't want them collecting personal identifiable information, but I know that "Joe Six-pack" doesn't care or even know any better. If the networks can start to make base assumptions like the average person watches 3 hours of TV a night, then they can tailor around that. Give me 3 hours of programming that I can watch when I'm ready. If Joe skips a commercial and gets a different commercial in its place, I don't think Joe is going to care. If the Tivo-like device changes the commercials between the time it was recorded and the time Joe watches it, I don't think Joe is going to care. Maybe the commercials change everytime Joe watches his favorite episode of WWF. Maybe the duration of the commercial breaks changed too, so Joe couldn't leave the room for exactly 3.25 minutes. If the Tivo-like device is rented through the cable company, then maybe they have stats as to the income level or service package the Joe has. With this, they know that Joe doesn't drive a Cadillac and never will. Start adding in purchasing abilities. So if Joe sees an add for Pizza-hut, can press the thumbs-up key and enter a few menu choices, then 30 minutes latter a Pizza is delivered, already charged to his tivo-account. Joe doesn't care that ABC now knows that he is one to advertise Pizza to at 6:30 on Saturday. It just happens that at 6:30 on Saturdays, Pizza hut or Dominos advertise immediately after a Budwiser commercial.
It is only us techno-philes that have any disdain for PIF. The networks should allow Joe to watch Buffy before the 6 O'clock news at 4 in the morning on Sunday. It shouldn't matter to them at all, except that Joe watches Buffy and the 6 O'clock news, and Joe wants to watch it at 4 in the morning on Sunday.
It predicted the rise of "BlipVerts" as advertising, in the use of short ads that flash constantly-moving and -changing images to the viewer because the viewers' attention spans had become so increasingly short.
It predicted the common occurrences of computer viruses, tapeworms, timebombs, and Trojan horses as ways of defeating other programs. In fact, one episode showed Max invading an enemy's computer network with an image of a wooden Trojan horse! Of course, today, these are well-known hackers' (crackers') products. It predicted what is known today as "page-jacking," or the surrepticious taking over of another's Web page, calling it "zipping" (of an online broadcast station's signal) in one episode. In the same "zipping" episode it introduced the idea of on-line shopping. It predicted, in a sense, the clandestine use of Web anonymizers or ways of being online without being tracked, calling the people who can do this "blanks."
It also included features such as televisions functioning as webcams, by remote control with two way feed, televisions which are manufactured without shutoff buttons, in a world where the television show/ network with the most ratings wins an election. And of course, my alltime favourite quote from The Max himself, "Why do you think they call it 'programming?'"
"I'd say 'Have a good time,' but arson is still illegal.
Sounds great. Now I'll just need TiVo to upgrade their cable box control software, so that if one show I want to record is in conflict with another, or if I forget to tell it to record a show, it will automatically reschedule that show for recording at a time when the TiVo is free.
My solution is very, very simple: stop watching the d*mned television.
It's all I can do not to curse about this but here it is as I see it: up until the 80's, you could expect an hour long tv show to consist of maybe 7 to ten minutes of commercials, and the rest being the tv show. Many, if not all, the commercials were for local companies and services. Fine.
We all know how commercials have become, so the market for the TiVO was born. In fact, over thanksgiving, at a relative's house, we tried to watch some james bond movie and it was, quite literally, 10 minutes of movie interspaced with 15 minute chevy/coke/dell commercial breaks. A 90 minute movie took THREE HOURS.
Of course, nobody who runs the networks likes that we have the choice to skip commercials or anything we're not interested in, so the odds are there will be no such thing as a TiVO in five years. If it takes technology like in the AOL case here, so be it -- if on the other hand it takes legislation, well then so be it too. My bet is that once the AOL device fails to sell (think DIVX) hollywood will simply make PVRs illegal.
You can see similar things happening in the movie industry; hell the last time I saw a movie I was shown SIX commercials before the previews began. And I had already paid something like 9 dollars just to get in. Think "captive audience" -- e.g., you and me.
I think what we need to start doing, here, is think about wether it's worth it.
Is it better to stay at home & watch TV, or to go out to a local coffee shop and write some code, read a book, or talk to a pretty girl/boy? Is it better to be steeped in advertising, or to go for a walk? (sadly, depending on where you live there isn't always a difference due to proliferation of billboards)
Anyway, what i'd really like to get at here is that once you get past the commercials, TV itself just isn't all that good -- and the world outside is SO MUCH BETTER.
I stopped watching TV four years ago -- with only the occasional late night conan o'brian and/or simpson's rerun. Since I gave up TV I've lost 20 pounds, gotten in great shape, dated much much more... etc etc. In fact, the only thing I'm missing is the internal scheduler I used to have which said "be home by 7 so you can catch ".
And, if you want to tell me "but cable has all these good shows" ask yourself if most cable stations hae commercials. As far as I know all but a few have *plenty* of commercials -- and yet you're PAYING for it. Paying! Bah! it's not worth it. At least normal TV is free.
Now, excuse me while I calm down. We shouldn't be fighting an escalating arms war to skip commercials -- we should simply stop watching altogether.
If you do, you'll thank yourself for it. Trust me.
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The ability to zap a commercial arguably makes the commercials more valuable. It will take some clever advertising to keep people from hitting the button, but on the upside, we no longer have to watch ads we despise.
Every time I see an Old Navy ad, I make a solemn vow never to set foot in one of their stores. Were I allowed to zap these commercials, I wouldn't loathe their store quite so much.
The fact that the commercials are being skipped could be useful information in and of itself. If such information were collected in an aggregate, private way, maybe advertisers would take the hint and stop running stupid commercials.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
You could also put keep commercials current. If you have a commercial for an event next Thursday and the person is watching the Saturday after they could 'refresh' the commercials so that they are newer.
Go out and get sailing!
This, in and of itself, does not bother the networks. The networks are largely aware that there is a limited subclass of the population that is going to find ways out of their pay schemes.
Their primary interest is not actually to eliminate this subclass. It's to make sure that they remain a subclass, and that their newfangled PVRs and the like don't spill out into the mainstream. It's only when they fail miserably at this (c.f. mp3s) that they will begin cracking down wildly.
No one really pretends that they can get rid of technological innovation like this. Geeks will always be ahead of the curve. The interest of the networks and corporations in general is in making sure that the mass population doesn't catch up with these foul innovations.
That's what MystroTV is about. Getting the mainstream to avoid fancy stuff like TiVos. The handful of us who already have TiVos? We're only of interest to them in that we'll show them the next innovation they have to keep limited to the elite.
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No, this is actualy just Time Warner going back to their pre-Ineternet per-AOL fiasco, Interactive TV. The model is completely unchanged from 1992, content to be stored in distribution hubs and downloaded on demand. The only thing that is interactive is you get to shop while you watch the crap.
These days I am pretty much a post-Tivo TV viewer. I don't rate the tivo features because I simply don't watch network TV - PERIOD. Heck we didn't even get the local network channels for over a year when we first got Dish TV and we never missed them.
The problem is that network TV gets worse and worse as the cost gets higher and higher. The last decent shows on US TV were Seinfeld and the X-Files, both long gone to reruns. Ad skiping technology is superfluous when the shows on offer are Joe Millionaire and the bachelorette.
The only significant feature missing from my dishplayer as far as I am concerned is removable storage. Give me the ability to plug in nice fat 160 Gb drives at a time via serial ATA and I can actually get to record some of my own stuff. At the moment we have 4 hours teletubbies, 16 hours Dora the Explorer, 8 episodes of Blues Clues and some sessamee street. I have one episode of the sopranos. Funny thing is that when I think about it most of the stuff on my dishplayer is actually more intellectually demanding than the average network tv show.
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