TiVo moving towards being a media-services company?
By Nilay Patel 
posted December 10th 2007 1:01PM
posted December 10th 2007 1:01PM
There's been a definite trend towards service integration at TiVo lately, with quite a string of partnerships to show for it: the company's gotten in bed with Music Choice, Picasa / Photobucket and Nero in the past couple weeks, not to mention the finally-happening Comcast rollout, Amazon Unbox and Rhapsody offerings. On top of that, the company is also finally capitalizing on its vast stores of aggregate viewer data, having entered into a deal with NBC to provide Nielsen-esque ratings data on a second-by-second basis. Given all the wheeling and dealing, it's not at all surprising that CEO Tom Rogers told the New York Times that TiVo has "substantially moved in the direction of becoming a media company," but it's definitely a big shift for the DVR company, which until recently was something of an outsider. That's all changed now, apparently -- according to Rogers, "all the networks" are in talks to land similar ratings deals, and that the company is "aggressively" trying to partner with the media industry. That sounds about right to us -- we haven't mentioned the deathwatch in a while, after all -- but we're just hoping all of this doesn't lead to even more targeted ads.
If I have to watch ads to pay for the "free" TV, I would much prefer they be targeted.
I agree, as long as they dont try to send me spam somehow through my email. Watching adds on tv that I actually want to see would be nice.
Exactly. I'm a single guy ... I'm not interested in Pampers, Tampons, or Diamonds.
I'd consider paying NOT to have to see another diamonds commercial.
Seriously.
They should get ride of the silly monthy fees, since they are alredy selling my watching habits.
And maybe they will one day, when the revenue from advertising is high enough. It's got to be one (monthly fees for listings & services) or the other (advertising) for TiVo to be in business.
Why does this news evoke visions of a post-apocalyptic society where people are addicted to TV and the "networks" measure ratings in milliseconds? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Headroom_%28TV_series%29
Good! Sell my viewing habits to NBC. Fuck it, just give them away. I don't care. Ya know what? I will pay YOU, TiVo, if you tell NBC that I was watching Studio 60. It seems they didn't get the memo that I was far from alone. Oh, and Conviction. That was an awesome show at a stupid time slot. Let NBC know I was watching that too!
I love TiVo, I really do. I love time shifting. Skipping commercials ain't bad either, but time shifting is far and away the biggest reason TiVo rocks. Sadly, I suspect it's also the biggest reason the afore-mentioned shows got cancelled. :(
So, TiVo, I love you, but I hate you. Anything you can do to stop my shows from getting cancelled is greatly appreciated.