TiVo May Be a Buyout Target

Moose writes "Ars Technica has a piece up about the takeover rumors surrounding TiVo, now that it has a lawsuit win to boost its chances in the marketplace. From the article: 'It appears that TiVo is at a major crossroads, with brilliant technology under what now appears to be enforceable patents and a rapidly growing subscriber base, but with larger players in the TV market lurking just out of sight, possibly with pen to checkbook already. The DVR innovator seems to have little control over its own destiny now, and future success may rest in the hands of the legal system. Godspeed, TiVo.'"

Comments

I want to switch, I really want to...

[aconn]

I am a cablevision subscriber. For $10/month I get their dvr service. Sure, their program guide is terrible. But I can cancel the service at any time. The recorder has dual tuners. I would love to switch to tivo, but it's not worth the extra money and (more importantly) loss of features to do so.

Re:I want to switch, I really want to...

[a_nonamiss]

I have a Motorola DCT6412 DVR from Insight Communications, and it's amazing what a firmware update will do. It used to be extremely bad . It was clunky, hard to use, and very buggy. The software was horrible. Then they did an unannounced firmware update to the box, and instantly, it was awesome. They changed the interface, (much "prettier" now) fixed the bugs. (and I mean all of them, including the ones you mentioned above) The menus were updated, and little things to make it more user-friendly were added. They even added features. (Series recording, notably absent from the original.) Now, I love that thing.

I know that there are several different firmware options for the Motorola box, but you should seriously inquire to your cable company to see if they are working on an update. I wish I could give you more details on mine, but it's at home, and I don't know the firmware information off the top of my head.

Re:Fallen out of love w/ TiVo

[kennedy]

you do know you can re-enable the 30 second skip at any time right? it's an undocumented feature that goes away if the tivo is restarted. while playing a pre-recorded item, simply press select-play-select-3-0-select

you will hear a happy confirmation tone.

Re:Haven't there already been...

[Jupix]

I don't know about that, but here's the /. article on the lawsuit. The link might have been useful enough to be included in the summary, IMO, but didn't .. naturally.

A Few Points

[Atomm]

I have a Tivo and I love it. It really has changed the way I watch Television. Yes, there are some short comings, but things are changing.

The new Tivo Series 3 adds HD Recording. It will have the ability to record one show and watch "live" television on another station. Even if both stations are HD.

It also adds the ability to hook up an External SATA hard drive to extend the storage capacity. No more cracking the case to add a hard drive. Finally, there is a RJ45 for standard networking connectivity.

Then, Comcast has agreed to go with Tivo for their customers. As a Comcast customer and a Tivo owner, I am really excited about this.

As for who would be interested in Tivo. I see two companies.

Apple - Tivo is Linux based. They have a lot of *nix experience on their side. It would really be a great Triple Threat for their Video offerings on ITunes. With the strong Tivo brand and the even stronger Apple brand, this would be a huge boost for Tivo.

Cisco - They already purchased Scientific Atlantic. They have their targets set on getting into the Consumer Market and really, really want to put a Cisco device on everyone's Television. Their motiviation is pushing Television over IP. They see it as the next big Networking push. And like Apple, they also have a ton of *nix experience on their staff.

I would be completely shocked if it was not one of these two companies that bought Tivo.

Tivo Is Dead! Long Live Tivo!