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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.
Tivo Tracks Titillating Timberlake Tit Touching!
Norman Cook's Ode to Sl
- 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?TiVo Watches the Super Bowl... oh, wait, that was about TiVo and the Super Bowl of Two years ago...
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See, TiVo's had their semi-permeable privacy policy since they started, as documented on
TiVo Data Collection Ramifications
TiVo To Sell Customer Data
Nielsen to measure TiVo usage
So, if this is shocking news to you that TiVo was able to quickly crunch the data and figure out the most rewound moment of the Super Bowl broadcast, you haven't been paying attention. They had this capability for any massively watched program since day one. It was part of the design of the system.
TiVo offers a detailed data service to broadcasters which lets them see by timestamp within an episode what moments people watched, rewound, and skipped. Rumoredly, TechTV's The Screen Savers bought that service once for just one episode, and it ended up proving that their managers where right about what people wanted to see a little more than the actual content-making staff wanted to hear.
The Super Bowl most rewound moment is something TiVo's been doing for years, just for the sake of putting out a press release to get the TiVo name into conversations about what we were gonna be talking about anyway the week after the event... and from Slashdot's coverage over the years, it appears to have worked.
... accounts for the majority of replays tracked.
I am not sure if that statistic includes me 'coz I haven't un-paused my Tivo yet :)
Free XBox, PS2
They did it last year, they did it the year before that. They stated in their initial company releases that this is what they intended to do.
And you know what?
-DirectTV pay-per-view tracks what I watch...
-My ISP knows what web sites I've requested...
-My credit card company knows what I spend my money on.
-My hospital shares its information with my insurance company, which in turn shares its information with my company. (Because they have to pay their share of the bills)
It's my TV viewing info... I don't care. If anything, if they sell my viewing habits and realize that Firefly and Farscape are more watched than My Big Sweaty Boyfriend... That's a GOOD THING!
Since Bush's State of the Union address.
> 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.
Fortunately, they still don't have the ability to track what your other hand is doing, at any time.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Crispin, always wanted to be in the Neilson ratings
----
Crispin Cowan, Ph.D.
CTO, Immunix Inc.
Is show some more detail about what commercials were most watched also...
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.
I am utterly failing to be either surprised or alarmed.
... so? Yes, I would be concerned if they said "Matt Hooper, 26, of Colorado Springs replayed the Janet Jackson breast scene a record 126 times. Sales statistics in the area also show an unusual spike in hand lotion and tissue purchases."
n y" standard Slashdot response, think about what you have trusted companies with. How many companies have your name and address? Your home phone number? Your bank account information? Your credit card information? Why did you trust them with such information, if no companies can ever be trusted?
OH NO! THEY CAN TELL THAT LOTS OF PEOPLE WATCHED THAT SCENE! DEAR LORD, THINK OF THE CHILDREN!
Ummmm
They haven't said that, or anything remotely resembling that. They have said "Tivo users watched this particular segment of the Superbowl more than anything else." So?
Yes, Tivo could do something horrible with my personal information. But then again, Hustler could also publish a big long list of everybody that subscribes to it, complete with home addresses, but they don't. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but at some point we just have to have some level of trust in other people. Tivo has said that my information is kept anonymous, and has given me no reason to doubt their word, so I don't see a big problem with trusting them.
And before you start the "oh-my-god-what-an-idiot-for-trusting-a-big-compa
If you have used a credit card, you must trust every single store at which you have ever swiped your credit card at least as much as I trust Tivo. If you have ever applied for a loan, you've coughed up your bank account information. And you're worried about someone knowing what television shows you're watching?
ZFS: because love is never having to say fsck
Here are a few links to a page on Norways biggest Newspapers website that show all the picture uncensored and even have the uncensored movie of her. Oh yes, it also includes the streaker that nobody in the US saw.
Click on "Neste Bilde" to see the next picture
Video
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
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
whats to gain by going lower then Zip code? nothing.
What TiVo provides in an acurate count of what people watch, each within a small segment of an advertised area.
Any finer data is worthless.
TiVo:"hey this address watches Bud Commercials, call budwieser and let them know! this way budwieser can try to sell this ONE houshold beer. Of course since it is so individual, it will cost $5000 a six pack."
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
When it is all said and done, all this did was prove once again why we should limit nudity, most people look much better with their clothes on, include Janet. Seeing her boob was quite a letdown, I'm not surprised that the SuperBowl ratings sagged a bit.
Ms. Jackson needs some support, and I don't mean from her family. One would think that they could implant some convictions to prevent this sort of droopy moral character in the future. We need more pert personalities to provide better role models for our country.
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
Since Bush's State of the Union address.
Yeah, but people were using fast-forward with that one, not rewind!
The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
I have to say in general that I don't trust corporations, however I don't feel the need to bolt on my tin foil hat after this revelation.
I do think that disclosed practices (such as anonymously monitoring for viewing habits) isn't necessarily a bad thing. I'm certain that Tivo has found and created new features based on viewing the tracking information.
I also think that Tivo stands a decent chance of displacing Nielsen's as a premier rating service. And as long as it is done anonymously, it is a god send. As I think that Tivo would more accurately reflect "real" viewing habits. (And of course possibly give it a geek edge, so that our favorite programing gets better ratings).
The second Tivo transitions over to a non-anonmous tracking service, is probably the day that their company headquarters will burn down. Outraged geeks will storm the place.
I think Tivo is continuing to walk on the correct side of a very tenuous debate over usability, tracking, and privacy invasion.
The comparison to Microsoft has to be made... If this were Microsoft I wouldn't trust them to track it, as they have a history of repeated violations of their own policies, written and stated. Whereas Tivo does not have that same history, that I am aware of.
Sorry, the broadcast specifically said we would need the express written permission of the NFL to redistribute any part of it...
Why don't I care?
1) I want TV exec's to know what I watch, so they keep it on the air.
2) I want Ad exec's to know what I want to buy, and how to make a commercial that captures my interest; I have free will and don't buy things just because Jamie Lee Curtis tells me too.
3) I want Tivo to stay and business, and better yet find a way to make enough to waive my monthly fee, without resorting to being asses about me hacking my Tivo to add a bigger drive, etc.
If it bothers you, grab a set of rabbit ears and disconnect from the grid. If you are upset that there isn't a full screen pop-up every time you push a button that the click has been recorded and may be sent to Tivo during the next phone connection, I don't want to hear it. If you own a Tivo and are just figuring this out, then I gotta feel you really aren't all that concerned about this anyway, or you would have bothered to check why your Tivo wants to call out every night.
Personally, I'd be more concerned about why the cable companies are working hard at getting their boxes installed in your house connected to their two-way network full time. How do you know there isn't a camera inside there?
You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.
Of course, next year, her nipples will have little stickers that say "Drink Pepsi!" on them... but hey, life's full of compromises.
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.
American men who watch football like women's breasts.
Especially when we've^M^M^M^M they've been drinking.
-- www.globaltics.net
Political discussion for a new world
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
Personally I'm outraged Janet had a piece of metal covering her nipple. That's complete bullshit.
(Please browse at -1 to read this comment.)
What's the big deal with a boob? Every kid sees tits from the second they are born (they depend on them basically). Seeing a boob on tv may just have made the kids hungrier, since it was dinnertime for alot of people.
When I saw it today I went and made a glass of chocolate milk for some strange reason.