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Has TiVo's Fate Been Sealed?
ChipGuy writes "Things are getting bleak for TiVo, reports the New York Times, and adds that TiVo blew a major opportunity to team up with Comcast. And that might have cost CEO Michael Ramsey the job. Om Malik writes that 'The fate of TiVo also highlights the dilemma facing a lot of "exploding TV" start-ups. The technology does not necessarily translate into profits and a business,' and breaks down the financials -- over half a billion dollars in losses so far. PVRBlog adds that 'When the story of TiVo is written, this Comcast negotiation could be the point when the company's outcome was decided.' More reactions here."
It is official; Netcraft confirms: Tivo is dying
One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered Tivo community when IDC confirmed that Tivo market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that Tivo has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. Tivo is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last [samag.com] in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.
You don't need to be a Kreskin [amdest.com] to predict Tivo's future. The hand writing is on the wall: Tivo faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for Tivo because Tivo is dying. Things are looking very bad for Tivo. As many of us are already aware, Tivo continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.
FreeTivo is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time FreeTivo developers Jordan Hubbard and Mike Smith only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: FreeTivo is dying.
Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.
OpenTivo leader Theo states that there are 7000 users of OpenTivo. How many users of NetTivo are there? Let's see. The number of OpenTivo versus NetTivo posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 NetTivo users. Tivo/OS posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of NetTivo posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of Tivo/OS. A recent article put FreeTivo at about 80 percent of the Tivo market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 FreeTivo users. This is consistent with the number of FreeTivo Usenet posts.
Due to the troubles of Walnut Creek, abysmal sales and so on, FreeTivo went out of business and was taken over by TivoI who sell another troubled OS. Now TivoI is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.
All major surveys show that Tivo has steadily declined in market share. Tivo is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If Tivo is to survive at all it will be among DVR dilettante dabblers. Tivo continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, Tivo is dead.
Fact: Tivo is dying
Eh TiVo will probably die, they have the entire TV industry against them. As long as I can easily buy a clone or make my own (with no restrictions) why should I care?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Where's my OpenCable Moxi?
(Translation: Does it matter if TiVo dies as long as something better comes along?)
'The fate of TiVo also highlights the dilemma facing a lot of "exploding TV" start-ups.',
ok, I admit I'm not real familiar with the latest in television technology, but exploding TV's? what could possibly be the upside of that? faced with that sort of danger you'd definately want a TV-b-Gone. I'd say if their TV's are exploding TiVo's fate has definately been sealed.
air and light and time and space
First, I have to take issue with the claim that such technology, concepts, and products are not enough for a successful business. I think their success to this point is evidence enough of the power of this kind of product.
On the other hand, I have to agree that Comcast has the power to propel TiVo into a different level of play. With that kind of support, they'd have a huge step up on all this exploding competition. That competition is finding ways to improve upon what TiVo already has - free listings, better storage, better interface, etc. Why compete directly when you could stand on the shoulders of Comcast?
Okay, so if I can pick up a TiVo for a couple of hundred bucks, how much is a MythTV box? You need a fast pentium box with a large HD, right? Plus a video encoder. What's the cheapest MythTV box that I could put together that competes with a base TiVo?
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
I would sure hesitate to buy one of Tivo's lifetime subscriptions right about now...
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Tivo is toast. It's a great product without question. The issue is that all the major cable companies (Comcast, Cox, etc.) are building those capabilities into the set top box.
Over Christmas, my grandfather asked about Tivo because his brother had recently gotten one. He really didn't know quite what it was, but he wanted one. So, we went to all the consumer electronics shops and looked into it. It was going to be $100.00 bucks after a rebate, twelve bucks a month, and then he had to get some kind of phone line across the room to the back of the TV. They suggested a wireless phone jack, which was an extra $85 dollars or so.
Instead of messing with all that, I stopped by the Cox office and they gave us a new cable box for free and the extra DVR functionality for an extra ten dollars a month over what he had already been paying. He's not going to notice a big difference between that and Tivo, so it's definitely "good enough".
I like Tivo's announcement about Internet-oriented content, but I just don't think they have a chance. EVERYONE and his mother is going after the set top box "center of the digital living room lifestyle". This includes at least Sony, Cisco, Microsoft, Apple, Nintendo, all the set top box manufacturers and cable providers, as well as many other upstarts. People will want as few boxes as possible (hopefully one), so products like Tivo that don't have the depth of stickiness, that aren't the anchor of critical functionality (cable TV vs. VCR, if you absolutely had to choose which one would it be). As such, Tivo is in big, big, big trouble.
First, TechTV and now TiVo? Damn you, Comcast!
In order for Tivo to survive against the snarly market forces of TV they would have had to promise even more invasive advertising to replace the ads we skip over. In two years Tivo would (will?) end up looking like a cheesy free web page with banner ads and annoying pop-ups. I'd rather live in the moment and go to the bathroom during ad breaks.
Ditch the service.
Open the box, screw this DRM'ed TivoToGo crap. Just open an SMB service, or ftp, or some such.
Sell the box at a profit. I'd pay up to 500 bucks for one, that just worked - always, regardless of whether TiVo is still in business. It's still cheaper than rolling my own with MythTV, and a whole lot less of a hassle.
Since that's not what they're going to do, since TivoToGo turned out to be useless - need a custom app to burn to DVD? And it's not out yet? And I'm supposed to buy what is basically the same Prassi/Stomp/Veritas software that I already have three copies of again for another 50 bucks?
Anyways. I like the TiVo interface. Good riddance to the rest of it.
I've been playing with MythTV. As soon as I get it working to my liking, my series 2 TiVo goes up on eBay. I'm getting there, it's nothing but time and effort.
I already know it'll blow TiVo away, it'll stream recorded content and live TV via VideoLan, which I can watch on satellite boxes, which I plan to be no more than some hacked XBoxes. It'll have (at least) two tuners. It'll record to DVD-R without jumping through hoops. It'll grab content from the 'net.
So on an offtopic note, anyone have an idea how support for the Hauppage PVR150MCE and 500MCE is going under ivtv? I got an itch to order the 500MCE (mmm two tuners, two encoders.. all for roughly the price of the 250), becuase it looks like it will be supported soon.. But I don't want to be stuck with a dud.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
The product was good, service was good but the rest of the business world (mainly M$) did
As rich and powerful as Microsoft is, they just don't have the kind of power you think they do, especially when it comes to markets outside of computer OSes. I can't believe you're sitting here blaming Microsoft for the fact that Tivo is a poorly run company...
The vast majority of business failures people think were somehow caused by Microsoft were really caused by the ineptitude of the company that went under. When Microsoft goes after a market, a well-run company will push them back (see: Quicken vs Microsoft Money). A poorly run company? Well... Darwin's law kicks in. Is that really Microsoft's fault?
and why I would never buy any piece of hardware that relies on a subscription. All the more if they offer a "lifetime" subscription where you pay up front. People have fallen into this trap with health clubs as well - what is the chance that the company behind the hardware will outlive me?
My rights don't need management.
The law of the bottom dollar says that if people can provide a service for themselves for free, they will. Most of them anyway. HTPCs increasingly become easier to build and cheaper to buy. Its always irked me that TiVo would charge you to use a device that you purchased legally. It'd be like Microsoft trying to charge me per megabyte to use my own hard drive. (I probably shouldn't even SAY that...) Ask yourself: how many people in the world still have milk delivered to their front doors? How many people still have their gas pumped by an attendant? How many people in the world will continue to pay for TiVo?
Electrons are free; it is moving them that becomes expensive.
Actually it's for the lifetime of the particular unit you're using. It's non-transferable to a newer unit, for example. But yeah, I assume the lifetime of Tivo as a company applies as well.
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TiVo really has only two things going for it:
* the program guide
* the interface
The program guide is really great, and the interface is incredibly easy to use.
The problem seems to be TiVo spends a lot of its money on the boxes. Hardware costs for the TiVo boxes totalled $68,056,000 for the last nine months of the last fiscal year. That's a lot of hardware.
They're also selling that hardware at a loss. HW Revenues were $60,823,000, with $29,508,000 in rebates. Ouch.
There's not a lot that TiVo can do, financially.
The TiVo service only cost $25,069,000 to run for those 9 months, while TiVo pulled in $81,311,000 in revenue. That means if they stopped selling TiVo boxes, they'd make money (though it's unclear from the revenue numbers if the tech revenues include partner hardware).
That won't expand their customer base, though.
Maybe they could spin off their guide business and license it to other box manufacturers? I'm sure TV Guide would love to buy it from them. It would free the guide to provide services to all the manufacturers, though they obviously have someone doing it already (who knows?).
Maybe they could contract to get the hardware built more cheaply?
The hardware is really killing them. Sure, they can't do a Microsoft (not at less than $1/subscriber/month for licensees). But they don't have to have high-end hardware either.
Even if they go bankrupt, look at replaytv...they were a startup and they went broke (people were buying tivo instead because of the much lower price because replaytv baked their lifetime price into the cost of the device)... sonicblue bought them and changed the model to match tivo but went bankrupt due to all the lawsuits over auto-commercial skip ... dnna bought the replay division from bankruptcy and is doing everything right: not investing too much in new features until the market makes it worthwhile while capitalizing on the slowly increasing market...
the only reason tivo didn't go sooner was due to large corporate backing and partnering with directv... even if they go, they'll survive in some form because this industry is gonna happen one way or the other (the other being cable/satellite boxes, etc)
- Sound dies if you process the power button on the remote accident. You have to unplug the unit.
- Program audio can get into "skipping", where it'll play a frame, then skip a frame, play a frame, skip a frame. Only way to fix is to change channels. Reweind/FF/Pause doesn't change anything.
- Locks up in the middle programs for no reason. Changing channels somtimes fixes it. When watching programs, you have to start over most of the time.
- Disk drive is noisy (lots of clicking), no sound insulation here like Tivo has.
- Channel changing is slow. No write cache. Pure raw disk IO it sounds like for all programs.
- Multiple tuner support is clunky and broken. It will tell you that you are recording on the current one when you change channels, but, are really recoding on the other tuner. It gets confused easilly.
- TiVo must have a patent on the "predictive response" when you press play. I can always nail that start of my programs with Tivo, but, on the Comcast I overshoot everything.
- The FF/RW functions don't have a way to decrease the speed. (IE, I KNOW this is the last commercial, don't go in 32x fast forward, go slower to 4x FF).
I have to say, I would have loved if TiVo was the Comcast PVR of choice. It's by far a better PVR system. But, re the post, I have to agree it's the nail in the coffin for them. I think the other nail is the intrusive advertising that they plan to do.I have Adelphia Digital Cable, and for a while I was tempted to get a TiVo. The cost was a little high, but I work odd hours and miss some of my favorite shows. I was tempted to get a TiVo until Adelphia offered a nice little DVR box for 9.99/mo with no up front payment.
Adelphia isn't alone in offering these nice little DVRs, either. TiVo had a great idea, and now that everybody and their aunt Jan can offer a DVR for a low low price, I just can't see TiVo moving millions of units.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
TiVo lovers (I used to be one myself) think this product is terminally cool because, when a TiVo box works correctly, it makes TV watching 100 times more enjoyable. But that, by itself, is not "success". Tivo lovers, though fanatical, are few and far between. TiVo has simply made too many mistakes. The platform is too klugy, so there's always been reliability issues. And if it does break, you have to send it back to the factory, for fees that approach the original purchase price. Even if nothing ever went wrong, most consumers just don't see such an expensive gadget as being worthwhile for what it does. This company is circling the drain.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but good "technology, concepts, and products" is not a guarantee of success. There are other factors: marketing, management, timing, access to markets, and just plain luck. The few techies that get rich making some amazing breakthrough get all the press -- but most innovative tech companies fail.
Which is true of all business. You can get very, very rich, but not without taking very, very big risks.
I was at CES. DirecTV is dropping TiVo for their own new custom-built upcoming DVRs. From what I understand DirecTV currently provides some life support for TiVo in the form of a rather inexpensive licensing/subscription fee for each user--but that will go away.
The interface is incredible; the remote is the best I've ever used for anything; the programming guide is extremely good... but anyone and their Mom can hack together a DVR at this point (not that it'll be as good as TiVo).
It's got less to do with others than with themselves. They worked hard to get the first product out, and then thought that the hard work was over. They haven't done anything truly innovative since v1.0, and never had a really good concept on how to make money beyond gouging customers $10 a month (later $13) for yet another TV guide. I've said it for a long time, they should have accessorized the TiVo like video game companies do, that's where the real money is. There's really not much of a "service" aspect to what TiVo does, and trying to artificially create one by selling the guide as such only angers those customers that see what's going on. They should have released their own branded external expansion hard drives (using 1394 over a proprietary connector if they wanted, to lower competition), they should have brought out external branded DVD or CD recorders and let the consumers burn shows (CD burners along with SVCD creation three years ago would have been the cat's meow, when DVD-Rs were still expensive), they should have offered unit-to-unit networking and cooperative recording and scheduling years ago, using their own branded Ethernet adapters, etc, etc, etc... Instead they took a good long nap and let the rest of the world pass them by. Oh well, I got my money's worth out of my TiVo, I won't be shedding a single tear when they pass.
/FCC/Fritz septfecta succeeded/will succeed in killing Tivo.
Anything beyond the control of the cable and media cartels will be killed at any cost. We have the FCC killing any dsl beyond the baby bells, by allowing the baby bells to let their copper die through neglect (which has been paid for by consumers many times over through tax deductions on infrastructure during and after deregulation) while they install fiber through the same consumer paid-for-through-tax-deductions infrastructure, while preventing resellers from accessing/sharing the fiber at reasonable costs. My dsl reseller currently pays more for my connection than I would if I purchased directly from my baby bell. On top of that, add cost of reseller isp dns servers, mail servers, other servers, add costs of support, all the other costs, and the baby bells are getting away with murder.
And at the same time, Powell and the FCC do nothing to ensure that end users are allowed to run servers, are allowed to use their dsl (or cable) connections for various purposes (ssh is considered running a server, vpn is considered business class, no mail server, no web server, p2p is considered running a server, so are many other uses). If I'm stuck with 2 sellers, baby bell and cable monopolies, at the very least, Powell and the FCC have to mandate that the common carriers are really common carriers, they have no control over what ports of the internet an end user uses, the entire internet is available to every user.
What good is pushing for an internet infrastructure like Korea has, with 100 mbps connections, when the local monopolies get to control what you can do, with such simple things as vpn, ssh, and similar vital services. Should we all use telnet?
If it is left to Powell, we'll end up with what others have already predicted, an entertainment device controlled by the entertainment cartel. Computing will be dead. Once the baby bells succeed in their single-minded mission of fiber everywhere so they don't have to share their lines with anyone, any guess as to which way prices will go? Choices on what you can or can't do with your connection? Speeds? Really believe you'll get the same speeds with fiber now than you will when the line-sharing competition is out of business? Really believe you'll get upload speeds equal to download? How about a 20 mbps download with a 128 Kbps upload, due to newly discovered "problems" or bandwidth "hogs".
Tivo is just a small subset of the overall problem.
As an aside, how do you use a tivo box that doesn't come from the cable company, if you have cable with a cable set-top box? Is it possible? What functionality does one lose?
What makesTiVo really great isn't the box, or the interface, or any of the generic PVR features, it's the TiVo service that makes it great and you lose that with everything else. It's the service that's worth it for me and what I don't mind paying for it. All these other PVRs are just hard-drive based VCRs with a GUI. Even a TiVo box is just a hard-drive VCR with a GUI without the TiVo service.
Sure you can get other PVR solutions to download TV-listings and they probably have something like TiVo's season pass where it can follow shows you have season passes to and tape them whenever they air (even if they are pre-empted). The one thing I don't know if anyone else has is the TiVo suggestions. I have my TiVo so well trained I don't have to use the TV listings anymore. My TiVo picks out most of what I watch for me. It's like hiring a personal secretary who knows your tastes.
After I come home for work and eat dinner, I usually have enough shows on my TiVo that TiVo picked for me to keep me entertained until I go to bed a couple of hours later. I don't have to surf channels, I don't even have to look at any listing to see if it's something I might like to watch and tell my PVR to tape it. It's gotten to the point where sometimes I don't even know what's on TV anymore and I don't care because I have more than enough shows I like to watch waiting for me each evening. I don't have to spend 20 minutes each day scrolling through a program listing of 500 channels to find the one program I might like to watch tomorrow and tell my PVR to tape it. For me I don't mind paying $12.95 a month if it means saving me 20 minutes a day in front of a computer or on a TV menu doing "prep-work" for my evening's TV watching. I will sorely miss this if TiVo were to go away.
Sell a quiet, stylish set-top computer with TV and stereo out, remote control, and wireless. This could be sort of like the MiniMac with Myth front end or a modded xBox, but this model should have lots of CPU and RAM. Build in DVD writer. Rather than emphasizing the recording TV side (this could be a Firewire add-on), emphasize the ability to easily play any format, however acquired. Quiet, cute external hard-drives could be added and daisy-chained.
... just add dumb terminals, up to 10 or 20.
Also sell cheap, stylish dumb terminals with bootable network card, and set-top box ready to serve. These could look like the new iMac, nice monitor, nice keyboard, nice mouse, but with low CPU, no HD, little RAM, etc. This way you can get away with charging a lot for the set-top, as much as or more than a good computer: it doubles as your server
This is the winning combo of 2005. The MiniMac and Xbox2 are light on power, skimpy on playable formats, and not ready to serve as dumb-terminals. They discourage bigger drives, don't burn CDs/DVDs, and don't come with wireless.
It seems like we get a Tivo doomsday article every 3-4 months.
http://slashdot.org/search.pl?query=tivo
Keep the Classic Slashdot.
I've had my TiVo for over 4 years now. I love it to death. I think that TiVo did a hell of a lot of things right. Some quick examples:
:-)
1. Unlike, say, Microsoft, they never discouraged their users from hacking their boxes. As a result, a huge community of TiVo hackers emerged (see http://www.tivocommunity.com/). I upgraded my TiVo's 30 gig hard drive to two 120's, and installed a cachecard/network card combo from 9th Tee, which means I can do fun tricks like scheduling shows and season passes from the road, or watching shows in my bedroom on my XBOX.
2. Really great support. I've only had to call TiVo a couple of times, both for channel lineup issues, but they were always extremely friendly and helpful over the phone. For example, after I moved into my new house, I realized that Adelphia had just upgraded the cable in my area, and TiVo didn't have the lineup yet. So I called support, and the next day, TiVo called me back to tell me that my lineup was added. Simply awesome.
3. Choosing Linux. When I telnet into my TiVo, I get a bash shell. I've installed an ftp server, web server (TiVoWeb), and even installed cron. How cool is that? Plus, this excellent decision has led to new software being developed exclusively for the TiVo (such as a caller id display that uses the TiVo's built-in modem, so you can see who's calling without getting up off the couch). Simply brilliant.
4. The interface. They obviously put a ton of work into it, and it really shows. It just kicks so much ass.
Now obviously, they dropped the ball in a couple of areas. The Comcast merger was just a more recent one. I think these are the two biggies:
1. I think that their biggest problem has always been slow adoption; as long as I've had the thing, I've been seeing ads pop up on TiVo Central giving me hot deals on new TiVo units, which I'm supposed to share with my friends and family. Great, I can save Dad $50 on his new unit. But if they really expect me to convince Dad that he can't live without a season pass on those Seinfeld reruns he loves so much, then they should be giving me the 50 smackers. I'd probably have 10 people signed up under me right now if I got some sort of compensation for it. (By the way, click here to get a free Mini Mac!)
2. Too expensive. The hardware and service together really do cost too much, unless you got in early like I did (back when lifetime service was $200). They should do what my damn cell phone company does: Knock the hardware down to like $99, and make me pay a very affordable $9.95 a month. If I try to cancel before 2 years are up, hit me with some obscene early termination fee. Yes, I hate it when cell phone companies do this, but that's how they stay in business. Besides, it's not like I'd be foolish enough to cancel my TiVo service anyway. TiVo is heroin. So far, I've paid $499 for TiVo and lifetime service, so TiVo won't make any more money off of me. If they were using my above plan, I would have paid in $589 so far, with more coming in every month.
I would really hate to see TiVo go. I hope they don't. But I suspect that even if the service dies, thanks to the openness of their hardware platform, someone (maybe me) will figure out how to write a script to pull show data off of Yahoo! TV or something. And with Microsoft and MythTV and several others entering the PVR market, there's no question that TiVo's invention is here to stay.
bort.
Free, Anonymous surfing: Pagewash.com.
Early TiVos were notorious for being shipped with flaky modems. But what really screws people over is the fact that the software upgrade process isn't failsafe. That is, software upgrades often fail, leaving the system nonfunctional, or nearly so, with no way to back things out. Hackers can re-image the system on their own, but most customers don't have that kind of skill. And you don't even have to option of refusing an upgrade!
Tivo needs (needed?) to not view its hardware as a mere commodity to be given away, but instead as a platform for innovation in and of itself. I'd consider buying a new Tivo if they did something else more interesting, such as allow for storage expansion via Firewire, DVD burners via Firewire, fast ethernet connectivity, etc.
That there has been no compelling reason for a geek to buy new Tivo hardware since I bought my standalone S2 in 2002 is pretty shameful (I don't have DirecTV, so HDDirecTivo isn't an option). It's super shameful that they won't have a CableCard HDTivo until 2006.
Dunno if a hardware move would help now, but hurrying along the CableCard-enabled HD Tivo would sure help.
Tivo also needs to keep their software moving forward; why not an IMDB tie-in (and hence, Amazon) to the details of a show on now playing? Leverage IMDB & broadband to provide me more show info. Use Amazon to generate DVD sales and comissions. This might sound too commercial, but it could be done at least as tastefully as the ads on the main menu.
And add a "geek" mode where we can have access to greater preferences and more recorder control (logical and/or searhces, 'don't ever record', on and on...)
Tivo spends too much time BSing around with features not core to the experience (Tivo2Go, HMO).
Besides, it isn't the hardware that makes people loyal TiVo users. I mean, anybody can slap together a digital video recorder. What gets people excited is the clever stuff the software. Not the obvious stuff, like "record every episode of Days of Our Lives" -- that's only slightly more sophisticated than what a VCR does. It's the really clever stuff. Like "they keep watching nature shows, so I'm going to record them without being told, if I have the spare disk space."
You license that software to other PVR makers. And you let anybody willing to pay $10/month subscribe to the data stream. Fewer expenses, just as much money. And no stupid cable/satellite companies saying "take out that feature or we won't pay you a pittance to resell your boxes."
Replay was a me-too product, in the public's eyes. It was the Creative Nomad, whereas TiVo is the "iPod". TiVo is already in the popular lexicon. Brand name can keep them around.
In theory.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
There are TiVo Service Emulators. They put a TiVo program delivery service on your local lan via apache + some modules or custom web applications. I'm guessing this is done via a filtering firewall so you can redirect requests to TiVo from your TiVo box to the local service.
I believe there are two groups out there doing this - one in Canada and one in Australia. I'm told they currently will not open their code to folks in the US because they want TiVo to stay around and make more units.
I assume if TiVo goes defunct, this code might become available.
When Tivo first came out I wanted one, but being a hacker I decided to build my own. I played around with my own stuff (glorified cron), MythTV, etc for three years. Then ReplayTV went TU and I got one cheap with a lifetime subscription. I haven't paid a penny since I bought it. It's the best money I ever spent. The service is awesome, the interface even my parents can figure out. At first it was a bit flaky, but I haven't had it crap out on me in over a year. I don't watch broadcast television anymore, having to sit through a commercial drives me insane, and there is always something good to watch whenever I want. I don't have to rush home or plan my life around when something is on, and I get to watch a lot of good stuff I wouldn't have otherwise because it comes on in the middle of the night. Plus, it is so awesome to be able to pause something when nature calls or the telephone rings. Besides the interface, which is simpler but not quite as powerful as Tivo's, is it's connectivity. It comes with a telephone and LAN connection, and the protocols have been reverse engineered so that it is simple to store, view, or serve video on a networked computer or computers. Both Tivo and ReplayTV allows you to convert to and from thier formats, but unlike Tivo it is an extremely simple, point and click, all commercials removed, burn directly to DVD affair.
So I repeat, ReplayTV soooooo kicks Tivo's ass.
http://james.nontrivial.org
The only reason Microsoft didn't kill Quicken is because the government wouldn't let them buy Intuit. If they had, Quicken would be dead and we'd all be using M$ Money, no matter how crappy it is.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
Tivo is dying because cable companies subsidize the cost of the hardware, market it better, and charge less per month than Tivo does. Cox gives me two DVRs for free with digital cable, and charges me 8 dollars a month combined extra for the service for the two units. The unit itself has about 40 hours storage, is approximate in quality to the Tivo Series 1. Is it worth it for me to go out and spend 2x$199 replacing the hardware, only to then have to spend more than 20 bucks a month in service charges? Absolutely not.
[DirecTivo subscriber]
My impression has been that the TIVO boxes are rather poorly constructed. I've had intermitten color problems (screen goes to black and white) with all three of my DirecTivo units, and one completely died in the year since I first jumped onto the TIVO bandwagon. I've heard alot about overheating problems and modem issues from other users as well. I imagine if they're selling the boxes at a loss of over $100 each. The service plans run $80 at Best Buy, which is a dumb buy relative to the price of the box. So almost every unit that breaks down means that they eat a fat loss when the customer buys a replacement unit. The dumbest part is that the warranty is only 90 days labor, 1 year parts. The labor is by far the most expensive portion ($90 minimum, plus shipping costs each way), so the customer is disinclined to even try to get the unit repaired after the first 3 months.
It's not the comcast deal that kills them, it's the money spent on replacing shoddy equipment.
They're half a billion in debt, but are currently making a profit. Frankly, the link to the "half billion" figure is to some jackass "Business 2.0" staff writer's personal weblog. This "Om Malik" guy doesn't really impress me. He's a lower-tier writer with questionable opinions. Frankly, anyone who looks only at debt while ignoring profits is a dunce. The /. article lapping it up is the typical misunderstanding of the world of finance. Nobody seems to understand the difference between "defecit" and "debt".
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
There's another little talked about reason why TiVO is losing users fast: "The VOIP effect".
In a nutshell: TiVO's internal modem doesn't work with most VOIP services.
Recently I switched over to Vonage. About a week after my Vonage service began I started getting messages on my TiVO telling me I needed to make my "daily call" because my program data had not been updated for a while.
I checked on the TiVO forums and sure enough there is a problem using TiVO's internal modem with most VOIP services. There are dozens of supposed workarounds but the success rate for these workarounds is apparently grim.
Series I TiVO users are truly screwed. Series II TiVO users can wire an Ethernet cable to the back of their TiVO to get listings via IP. But even TiVO acknowleges that most TiVO users probably don't have Ethernet cables in their living rooms.
There are also many hardware fixes I'm looking into. (But soldering a modem to my TiVO motherboard hardly seems like a fix that most people are going to want to deal with).
The bottom line is this: As VOIP sweeps the nation, its also sweeping TiVO away.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
Oh gentle lightspawn, you are too nice. Comcast's DVR is so unusable it can only have been designed by corporate marketing people.
Comcast's DVR has none of the core "I like this program, automatically record it for me next time" features found in Tivo.
There's no concept of recurring recording of your favorite shows.
The resolution for the graphics on the program guide is so course only a few lines of channel info fit on the screen at once. And a big chunk of the screen is allocated to horribly low quality ads.
Yes Comcast was big and stubborn enough to stick it to Tivo, even if that required sticking it to their own customers.
Can a bunch of us buy Comcast stock and then raise a ruckus at a stockholders meeting?
Ben in DC
PublicMailbox at benslade dot.com
Ben in DC
"It's the mark of an educated mind to be moved by statistics" Oscar Wilde
-shrug-
I recommend them to everyone i know and everyone i recommend it to buys it and likes it. If they can't make money off a product like that they should fire their entire business and marketing departments. It's like a restaurant that opens, is super busy, and closes 6 months later. That's a sign that somebody didn't think through the business plan. Here's a hint: when you're making up scenarios for that big Excel spreadsheet, and you add up the column for "Staggering Success", and the number at the bottom is still negative, it's time to get a new plan or at least a new spreadsheet.
The players tried to take the field. The marching band refused to yield...
Note to DirecTV: I only subscribe to DirecTV FOR TIVO. If you dump Tivo, I'll dump DirecTV. Probably like Best Buy you figured in losing the "small amount" of geek business and you don't care. You should figure in how much business we brought by word of mouth and being tech mentors to our friends (yes, we DO have friends). We'll take THOSE with us, too.
If you subscribe to DirecTV join me and tell DirecTV not to dump TiVo.
If DirecTV screws it up, we'll get into the TiVo saving and Myth TV setup business.
Let's hope the new TiVo CEO sucks in his pride a makes a deal with Comcast and DirecTV to make the "new" DVRs TiVo DVRs.
Otherwise, it won't be the first time that a superior product disappeared due to market, business, and political pressures, - see BetaMax, CP/M 86, Word Perfect, Lotus 1-2-3,
Ever dream you could fly? Get up from the Flight Sim. I Fly
And we love it. Even my wife, who was way too skeptical and thought I'd watch too much TV, can't get enough of it. It really makes our TV viewing more enjoyable, even given teh fact that we can pause something (live), shut the TV off, have a peaceful dinner and they still be able to watch something in its entirety. We can also watch what we want to watch, when we want to watch it. Have some free time when I get home? Three episodes of Overhaulin' is waiting for me. We can watch "24" commercial-free if we want.
It is pretty obvious the CEO is an ego-maniac in the form of the original Steve Jobs. He's making the same mistakes, basically. Thinking they can go it alone is akin to signing a suicide note. This idiot blew it time and time again and now me and thousands of others may end up with a worthless hunk of junk and a wasted $500.