How TiVo Gets Lost

TiVo pioneered the TV set top box revolution before digital video recorders became commonplace – but is this further proof that every new piece of technology has its day?

TiVo has launched with much fanfare in NZ but it’s not the TiVo in the USA in that it’s locked in with Freeview and not SKY and therefore does not give you the choice of recording hundreds of channels.

My experience of TiVo in the states was impressive when I discovered if you were a Simpsons fan, the magical machine could sit at home while you were out and record every Simpsons episode on any of the hundreds of cable channels you were subscribed to. But that was in it’s infancy. How the TV world has changed.

Cable operators now offer their own set top box, the audience is moving to watching TV on demand on the net or downloading TV programmes, legally or illegally. The TV audiences like the TiVo concept of watching exactly what they want when but now there are many avenues in which to do this, without being tied to a TiVo solution.

Not surprisingly, the New York Times notes the same observation and reports today that TiVo “has been struggling for years as cable and satellite companies offer set-top boxes with their own digital video recorders that allow people to pause and digitally record live television.”

And it reveals that last November, TiVo said its subscriber base fell by 21 percent, to 2.7 million, from 3.5 million the year before. In the hope of becoming noticed again., the company is about to launch yet another set-top box as if we really want to add to the clutter gathering around our giant TV sets.

Called TiVo Premiere, the new slender hardware will put regular program listings from cable and satellite on the same page as related material from the Web.

For example, a prominent search box on the service allows users to look for, say, “The Office,” and quickly find the regular TV listings of forthcoming episodes as well as older episodes for rent on Netflix and Blockbuster, outtakes and deleted scenes from You Tube , and merchandise related to the show for sale at Amazon. TiVo’s chief enthused:

“This takes broadband and broadcast and puts them all together as a single experience. You have your cable box, your movie box, your music box, your Web box and your DVR all in one.”

Call me different but I’m not sure that, when I want to watch an episode of Lost, I also want to see what Lost dolls Amazon can sell me or go to the Lost website all at the same time.

It feels like that nasty experience of being bombarded by an avalanche of spam pop-ups when you go to a Web site. I have a feeling this is evidence of desperate times for TiVo to appear relevant

And I predict it won’t save them..