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Clones Are Overwhelming TiVo
jfruhlinger writes "The first line from this CRN/Associated Press story says it all: 'Debra Baker tells people she has TiVo. But she really doesn't.' As cable companies offer their own DVR boxes to customers for no upfront cost and a lower monthly fee than the original, people are using TiVo as a verb but are frequently not using using the product or service itself in real life. The article notes that the cable company's DVRs don't have some of the archtypical TiVo features, such as the ability to guess what you'd like recorded based on your viewing habits."
record only first runs.
as it is now, they record all showings.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
One phone call to either TiVo customer service (or DirecTV's customer service if you own a "DirecTV DVR powered by TiVo" device) is all it takes for them to send your device a signal to stop uploading the viewer-habits data. True, that's opt-out rather than opt-in... but at least they're making it easy to get out.
Me... I kinda like the fact that it reports what I watch. I've always wanted to actually count in the ratings...
I love my TiVo, but is they haven't really dropped the price (or expanded the storage/dollar) as hard drive prices have fallen. I have to say that some competition is welcome.
There's really a "Tale of two TiVos" going on...
The integrated TiVo and DirecTV combo boxes, known officially as a "DirecTV DVR with TiVo" and commonly called a "DirecTiVo", have fallen in price dramatically recently. The units that were first sold for $299 are available for just $99 thanks to major subsidies from DirecTV. The service fee is only $4.99 per month and covers all TiVo units on the same household account.
Meanwhile, the prices of the Series 2 stand-alone TiVo units have not fallen, and in fact their service costs went up to $12.95 per month with no discounts at all for having more than one. Clearly, being able to integrate with service providers is key for TiVo's survival...
Nothing in TiVo's DirecTV contract prevents them from working with cable companies, only other DBS companies like Dish Network and Voom... clearly TiVo would like to have a dual-tuner-integrated box for digital cable, but the hardware makers aren't giving up the specs for that...
The one thing tivo does have is the best remote control of any DVR. It is just beautifully engineered.
I'm sorry if this somehow gets marked as flaimbait, but Tivo ASKS YOU if you want your information used for data collection so the corps can see that shows like Farscape are more popular and possibly stay on longer if more people did this. If you dont like it? Simply choose 'NO' .. I can't believe you thought this was manditory? They keep NO VIEWING INFORMATION if you dont want them to. Sheesh.
I had a TIVO for a day, until I found out I could not record without paying TIVO $10/month.
When I bot it I thought I could program it like a VCR. Turns out you can, if you pay them.
The idea is great, no more tapes, but TIVO's
version isn't it.
mike
What gets me about the subscription and surrender-privacy model with Tivo is that the features you get from Tivo don't really require a subscription. You can create a set top box that saves video to a hard drive, lets you pause and rewind, etc.. without a "subscription" to anyone. And you can be sure your viewing habits aren't being monitored.
whirrled peas.
I have a TiVo and a friend with a Scientific Atlanta DVR. I can tell you that the Scientific Atlantic user interface isn't any where as nice as the TiVo. I can do without TiVo surprising me with programs it decided I wanted to see, but it sure is nice to be able to do wish lists. The differences between the user interfaces on the SA and the TiVo seem to me like comparing a Mac to DOS 6.0.
While that's true for broadcast it's not uniformly true for CATV - though HRC and IRC are now mostly losing the battle - check out http://www.jneuhaus.com/fccindex/cablech.html for a list of freqs
Aspirin was a trademark of the Bayer Corporation in Germany, but was forced to give up the trademark as part of the treaty to end World War I. Interestingly enough, Heroin was also a Bayer trademark. See this article for more info (see last paragraph)
It'd allow TiVo to take advantages of several features already enjoyed by DirecTiVo owners...
- Faster response to changes. If there's a last-minute change by the TV networks due to something like a presidential speech, the signal providers are usually good about updating their guide data as soon as they know about it. However, if you don't have a "daily call" between the change and the event, you're going to record the wrong programs because you don't get word of the change.
- Another data source. It'd be great if TiVo could just use the data that's being pushed out by the system operator instead of having to license it from Tribune. There would be coverage for company-specific Pay Per View channels that Tribune doesn't cover, and channel lineup changes would be detected and adjusted for as they happened. (The cost of the data and piping it over a modem are the main reasons they have to charge so much for a subscription.)
- No missed changes. TiVo's pretty reliable at getting digital cable boxes to change channels by IR blast, but they're not perfect. However, when it's all on the same board there's never an accident that way.
- System timekeeping. Ever notice that your digital cable box is a very accurate clock that you don't have to set? There's already a time signal on the wire, and TiVo could benefit from that instead of having to use NTP over a modem connect. Also, this time broadcast would account for any relay delays inherent in the network, if any.
If you have DirecTV, call 800-347-3288 and opt-out. If you have any other TiVo, call 877-367-8486 and opt-out. I don't know why we're still having this discussion. Either the parent is ignorant or has an axe to grind. Parent - crying wolf about this hurts the fight against REAL invasions of privacy (PATRIOT Act, Operation TIPS, Total Information Awareness).
"I've been curious about that since I first got digital cable, which has recently been upgraded to Comcast's DVR. How do we know that the box isn't sending info back about what we watch?"
Comcast is more likely to use their DVR to spy on their subscribers to make sure people aren't "stealing" extra channels that they aren't signed up for. To my knowledge, Comcast is not offering viewer information to advertisers, although it would be an easy way for them to increase revenue or use it in negotiations when Viacom or Disney start demanding fee increases for channels that Joe Public doesn't care to watch yet is forced into the programming bundle.
Either way, Comcast's DVR does not offer the functionality that TiVo does. It is a shame that Comcast won't roll out actual set-top boxes with TiVo built in considering Comcast is a shareholder in TiVo. The same goes for Cox and Time Warner Cable. Yet none of them are deploying TiVo boxes. I think most of them believe that if they hold stock in TiVo, TiVo won't turn around and sue them over IP violations like TiVo did with Dish Network (Echostar) over the DishPlayer PVR.
However, Joe Public will have a remedy come July 2004 when FCC rules take effect that allows us all to buy our own digital set-top boxes instead of being at the mercy to rent whatever cable box is best to the cable company financials. That means we might actually see TiVo-branded digital cable set top boxes for sale at Best Buy.
The only area of concern I have for this digital jump is the lack of support for recording digital audio. I had an indepth conversation with a TiVo tech last week and he basically said the reason why existing TiVos do not offer SPDIF ports is that TiVo is afraid of being sued over DMCA violations because it would mean that the TiVo is making an exact copy of a digital audio signal from a program and archived on the customer's DVR. Perhaps they have their hands full fighting behind-the-scenes the "broadcast flag" requirements the FCC is trying to hoist on the whole industry while fighting the IP lawsuit against Echostar...
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
"In the future, this could lead to "digital cable ready" TVs and devices, including TiVo that won't need the assitance of a settop box. "
July 2004 is when FCC rules go into effect that you and I can go to our local Best Buy and buy a digital cable set top box. Call up Comcast Customer Service. They will confirm it. I know I did after they installed a crummy General Instrument digital set top box that had a hole in the place of an S-Video port, had a covered up SPDIF port, and didn't offer a serial port for a separate device (like my TiVo) to change the channels. If you are upgrading to digital cable before the July 2004 timeframe and you are with Comcast, specifically request that they install the Motorola set-top box. That has all of those ports. Its too bad it doesn't have component outputs though...
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
I also have a system based on Sage TV, but I constantly have to refer to is as 'TiVo', or else people look at me like I'm nuts. It's called a Proprietary Eponym; TiVo has become the eponym for DVRs. I knew High school English would come in handy some day...
Simpsons episode 9F08. Homer made Bart a "clown bed" that was hideous looking. Bart was scared of it. Hence, the phrase.
You can get what you want. The Toshiba DVD player with built-in TiVo and the Pioneer DVD recorder with built-in TiVo both come with TiVo Basic, which has no recurring service costs. TiVo Basic includes a reduced programming schedule (3 days I believe?) and only lets you set up recordings manually - either via timer or be selecting them from the program guide. This is *exactly* what you say that you want.
Once upon a time, old people called all video games "ataris". Then it was nintendo, which stuck until the Playstation came out, at which point there were three systems that old fogeys were forced to noticed and they realized that there was a whole class of items known as "video games".
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Uhh they are. Read that definition again. Specifically the beginning:
"A word formed from the initial letters of a name, such as WAC or Women's Army Corps".
DVD - Digital Versiatile (or video) Disk
VCR - Video Cassette Recorder
ATM - Automatic Teller Machine
SUV - No idea don't have them in this country
They are not abbreviations.
Mythtv runs on linux.
It is licensed under the GPL.
http://www.mythtv.org/
The interface makes Tivo look like a weak sister in most areas, and has FAR more capabilities.
On well tested hardware and using well tested distributions, it can be set up in less than an hour, including Dling the software and deps/updates. YMMV, severely on poor hardware.
(via KT333/400) There are numerous well written how-tos, and one of the better mailing lists you will ever see.
Sound setup under Linux is typically the headache, as you can imagine.
There is a Knoppix based CD version, knoppmyth, but R4 is bit dated. It CAN be installed and VERY carefully upgraded, as mythtv is available for Debian.
One good, well suported setup---NF2 MB, Athlon XP, OSS audio, GF4 MX400, and FC1. (There are folks using it all dists tho)
I personally found Mandrake Cooker to be just as easy, easier in fact as it is "current" to the point of bleeding continuously, as my "backend" is my "workstation", and that's my comfortable distro of choice. Again, YMMV.
My new frontend is an Xbox, and it works beautifully, excellent TV out, DVD remote works perfectly, fully mapped to run Mythtv properly.
It runs Debian, xbox-mythtv, a tweaked version of Xebian.
These analog channels need to be MPEG encoded before being saved onto disk and before you can enjoy your DVR functionality. Not only do cable DVR's need an MPEG encoder, but they also need full blown tuner which is expensive. So I wouldn't say that cable has any unfair advantage at all.
He could also dictate the direction of TiVo, optimizing them towards DirecTV support even more so than currently. HDTV makes no sense outside of Satellite, so I would expect Murdoct to have the first availible direct-digital integrated HDTV DVR.
Then suppose they add a digital out connector to a computer for archiving, which would work with ATI Video boards? Cable companies would become the low-end prole option overnight.
I'm hoping that was a joke without the smiley.
For those that might not know, they were required to release the source by GPL. TiVo is based on Linux (my Series 1 runs on the 2.1.24 kernel.) The source code is primarily just the UI you see on the screen, though. A good portion of the real magic is in a custom ASIC.
However, I would maintain that no one else has been able to "easily copy" TiVo. The bugginess and lack of a friendly UI in competitors is ample evidence of this. TiVo was created by a talented group of folks who invested a lot of effort and did their homework. However, never underestimate a cheaper price coupled with barely adequate functionality that slowly improves but never quite gets there. Heck, that's Microsoft's entire business model!
Heh, you can go ahead and sniff the FTP traffic, and see for yourself what is sent, and what is not sent after opting out.
Plagiarize much?
It's also worth mentioning that the guide info provided by TiVo is quite a bit more detailed than what you're likely to get for free. I have an upgraded TiVo (a Philips HDR112 with 200 GB of disk (it shipped with 14), 32 MB of RAM (it shipped with 16), and a TurboNet), and I've recently started fooling around with MythTV. While it's much easier to rip video from a MythTV system (export the video files with Samba), I've noticed that the program info it provides isn't nearly as comprehensive as what TiVo provides. TiVo provides a more thorough description of most programs. It also lists the major actors in a show, which is how you can tell it to record everything with your favorite actors (whoever those are) whenever it comes up. A wishlist entry for William Shatner, for instance, would dig up stuff like his Twilight Zone episode(s) and Incubus. (It'd also pull in Rescue 911 and T.J. Hooker...whether that's a Good Thing is an exercise for the reader.)
The TiVo interface is also a fair bit easier to get around. In fairness to MythTV, it's not been around nearly as long, yet it's reasonably useful. It'll get more refined as time moves along.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.