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Tivo Tracks Superbowl Viewing Habits
ThePretender writes "Sprinkled in the Janet Jackson boob stories is an alarming bit of information: Tivo tracks subscribers' viewing habits. They know how many times the boob was viewed, among other good-to-have (meaning data worth $$) information. Yes, if you agreed to Tivo's privacy policy you knew they could do this, with the promise that you aren't identifiable. Put on the tin foil hats? Or just another way for them to keep your monthly fee down (snicker)." A story from 2002 has more information and makes clear that Tivo does have the capability to record every click you make on the remote control, at all times. Previously Tivo said they tracked 10,000 people for the Super Bowl, this year 20,000.
HDTV broadcast beat out the use of my tivo this year. i didn't even record the superbowl on it. HDTiVo is supposed to be coming out sooner than later for a retail price of $999, dish only. I don't think i'll be buying it right away.
- Privacy advocates have decried such technologies as invasive, but TiVo officials say they do not pass along information that would identify individual viewers.
While it's true that TiVo needs to collect "every click" as the first part of compiling this aggregate data, if the final data is just summarized habits of TiVo users with no individual information, is there a privacy issue?Didn't we basically have this same story TWO YEARS AGO????
---- It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again. It does this whenever it's told.
I'd like to see a distribution of the amount of time the machine was kept on pause during that event. That would yield another interesting statistic. ;-)
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
I just can't help but think that if real viewing stats were used as predictors of progamming popularity, we might have more stuff like Firefly, Mythbusters, Penn & Teller's Bullshit, etc. and less Everyone Loves Raymond, Friends, Frasier, or a million indistinct reality TV shows.
If it keeps shows I want to watch on the air longer, then let them see what I'm watching and recording, I say.
-B
Ash and Hickory, straight-grained and true, make excellent bludgeons, dandy for the cudgeling of vegetarians.
Some of you may have heard that CBS refused to air the winning MoveOn.org's " Bush in 30 Seconds " ad. Just prior to the Superbowl, MoveOn.org asked their subscribers/readers to boycott CBS by switching from CBS during the commercials to CNN, who were airing their 30-second spot.
Presumably, Tivo knows precisely how many people actually went through with it.
My
Limekiller
What I wonder is if TiVo is supplying the networks with information on commercial skipping, in return for not being sued for allowing such skipping?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
If you really don't want them to be 100% aware of your habits generate some random noise.
The modern method would be an IR-equipped laptop which can change channels/volume/etc randomly while you're away (just have your TV volume down).
Or you could do it the old fashioned way (tape a few dozen remotes to the ground of a small room, put a few dozen cats in room... or just tape remotes to cat's feet).
I'd defintely have to agree with you. Owning a Tivo myself, I also make use of the "thumb" buttons to rate each show I watch, on the [doubtful] chance that it'll effect something somewhere. When you think about it, if you aren't a Nelson family, then you really almost have no voice on what is on television. This way, at least the stations know what you like/dislike. Also, it isn't like they didn't say they didn't track anybody, just that they won't personally identify you.
greed - the posting was way over the top for something that is old news. If you own a Tivo and didn't know this was taking place, then you haven't been paying attention.
Wouldn't surprise me if that's the problem - the original poster not owning a TiVo, and commenting on something he therefore knows little about. Everybody I know that owns a TiVo, as well as TiVo owners I've talked to on various message boards (such as at tivocommunity.com, seems to know and be perfectly fine with this practice.
And speaking as a TiVo owner myself, I have absolutely no problem with it. In fact, I tried to sign up to have my data collected non-anonymously - a service TiVo allows their customers to provide optionally (their web site wouldn't accept my TiVo model # when I tried to sign up). People complain constantly about the poor state of television in this country - this is how you go about changing that. If a show sucks, you don't watch it, and TiVo knows it and will tell the networks. I want TiVo to know that my viewing consists primarily of Antiques Roadshow, Once and Again reruns, The Office, Survivor and Mystery Science Theater 3000. And I want the added leverage (however small) of having an actual name attached to that data when it reaches the networks. I am not concerned in the slightest with how the networks plan to use this information, but if you're that embarrassed about your TV viewing habits that you can't bear the thought of anybody else knowing about them, then either just stay anonymous or don't buy TiVo. But they're not trying to hide anything - they post their privacy policy all over the place when you sign up.
I just keep my Tivo unplugged from the phone line. Tivo can only transfer the data if you plug it in (to either the phone or the internet.)
Admittedly, my Tivo has been complaining forever that it needs to make a call - but that doesn't seem to affect anything. (They claim it needs to make a call to "get the latest updates and channel information" - but so far it hasn't been necessary)
Plus why would they allow things like this?
The entire "sports copyright notice" required by the league is unneeded.... current copyright law doesn't even require "Copyright 2004" to be displayed. Everything gets full copyright protection the moment it is created by default, no action is needed.
This part I have no problem with. What I have a problem with is the fact that they not only claim copyright to the telecast, but that even "accounts of the game" are prohibited.
I guess if I watched the game on TV, they could hold me liable for copyright infringement (my account is a derived work of their telecast?).
But what if I'm at the game? Can I go home and give an account of the game without getting attacked by legions of rabid lawyers?
The vast majority of the criticism has not been of the "Think of the children" hysterical condemnation school, but more a sense of outrage that this what is considered entertaining (bad dancing, crappy music, insincere patriotic posturing, crotch grabbing, fake astonishment, and showing a tit). The sheer lack of spontenaity, the absolute absense of anything remotely resembling talent, the dearth of inspired performance plus the Janet Jackson tit exposure left many feeling rather insulted, that the show was conceived by either an inexpirienced and purile mind or by a has been who is desperate to regain the spotlight.
Think back to the rather sterile, emotionless and absolutely unerotic kisses exchanged betwteen Madonna and Britney/Christina. Same crap, nothing spontaneous, nothing titilating, nothing exciting in the least. Simply juvenalia at its absolute, unentertaining worst.
As to why this devolution into the mindnumbingly boring realm of poor imitations of a seventh grade boy's psyche, perhaps it is evidence that the entertainment industry knows they are obsolete, they are desperate to retain the spotlight, and uncertain of when the public will realize that this dinosaur has no more new tricks to perform, and their hired talent no longer has anything with which to keep our attention. If they can't have our devotion, it seems they'll settle for dissatisfied scorn.
Read, L