TiVo from AdZapper to Advertiser's New Best Friend

Thomas Hawk writes "A lot of noise has been made lately regarding TiVo's transformation from an ad zapper to Madison Avenue's new darling. In their first podcast ever, TiVo explains how they hope to redefine advertising in the age of the DVR through a customer centered approach. I'm not sure you are going to see TiVo changing their slogan to "we'll leave a light on for you," anytime soon, but with DVR penetration hitting mainstream how will their new initiatives change your TV viewing experience?"

Bah, screw Tivo.

[pecosdave]

I use MythTV. I does everything I would want a Tivo for, records every instance of a program, lets me pause live TV, time shifting in general. On top of that it has a deadicated weather module, video game management, music player/management, netflix management, and a photoalbum. I'm sure I've missed a few things. I'm plaaning on building a dedicated MythTV backend and setting up several front ends throughout the house all sharing the same central content. Screw Tivo, I like this better.

my experience

[gEvil (beta)]

I have a DirecTiVo, so I haven't seen any of the newer features they've been unrolling. However, I do get the daily advertisement listed towards the bottom of the main TiVo menu page. I've watched a few of these. In fact, thanks to one of them, I won a Logitech Harmony 880 remote! If they keep the ability to view the ads optional, then I'm fine with it (much like Google ads). However, if they shove them down my throat and make them unavoidable, then I'll think about taking my business elsewhere.

Re:does tivo matter to adverts?

[barjam]

You must not own a TIVO or know anyone who does. If there is something on live TV that I want to watch I hit record and come back later.

The last thing I watched live was this year's Superbowl (oddly enough, for the commercials). Before that? The previous year's Superbowl.

Re:some personal thoughts about advertising

[slapout]

I agree. I've actually shown friends & family good commercials that happened to get Tivo'd during a show I'm watching.

Changing the way I view TV

[monopole]

Yeah to SageTV, or MythTV. Frankly Tivo is turning into Max Headroom TV. Rather than giving you control, they give the control and information to the Ad companies.
I'm predicting that the next Tivo headline involves giving all info to the NSA.

We never watch commercials

[Kombat]

My wife and I almost never watch live TV. Virtually everything we watch is pre-recorded (the exception being the odd hockey game). When we watch the shows we've recorded, we never watch the commercials. We fast foward through them all, as quickly as possible. I don't care if they're funny or amusing; they're still trying to sell me something. I just want to get back to my show.

We notice an amusing side-effect of this whenever we go out to the movies (once every 3 months or so), because we don't recognize any of the posters for upcoming movies! Virtually all the previews we see in the theater are brand new to us. The only reason we know about new movies at all is by media buzz ('Da Vinci Code,' 'Brokeback Mountain', or word of mouth from friends ("Did you know they're making another X-Men sequel?"). It's kind of funny, and the first time we noticed it, it really reminded us of how dramatically our viewing habits have changed thanks to the PVR.

Re:some personal thoughts about advertising

[mboverload]

You should see HDTV commercials. I know it sounds stupid, but I really don't mind watching them that much. HDTV showing all the pointless nature scenes in drug commercials are suddenly not so bad.

Ad quality

[Iphtashu Fitz]

I don't mind watching certian ads as long as they're of decent quality. On the other hand, there's one ad in particular that I refuse to watch. It's an ad for a local discount furniture store (I'm in the Boston area). All the ads feature the two owners and end with their stores jingle. It's the only ad that I will purposely go out of my way to either mute or change channels when it comes on, even if the remote is on the other side of the room. I simply can't stand their voices, their ads, or their jingle. And they run their ads every morning during all the local news casts, so I see/hear them virtually every single day. They've done a very good job of ensuring that I will never visit their stores, simply because their ads annoy me so much.

The point I'm trying to make is that if ads are made interesting and entertaining I'll be much more likely to watch them. If they get on my nerves then I'll be sure to skip them by whatever means necessary. If advertisers keep this in mind then they'll do a better job of getting eyeballs in front of their ads. Of course, entertainment value depends a great deal on relevence, so better targeting of ads, like what TiVo hopes to do, is big.

Love TiVo...stopped recommending them

[scuba_steve_1]

I love my TiVo. The software and data feed is amazing and blows the doors off of the cable DVRs that I have used. That said, I stopped recommending them to friends and family over a year ago. The continual erosion of flexibility and empowerment coupled with them pushing folks away from the lifetime subscription option and forcing folks to have a recurring subscription expense just sours my taste for their product. I dread the day when they remove my cherished "30 second skip ahead" function...but I bet it is coming.

I now tell non-techie folks to get a (nearly free) cable DVR and tell my tech geek friends to build a MythTV box. TiVo will never see another dime from me...which is too bad, because the cable card HDTV TiVo looked nice...but not if I am going to have pay a fortune to have the privilege of being an advertiser's bitch.

deja vu all over again

[greg_barton]

Tivo's "Product Watch" thingie is deja vu all over again for me. I was lead techie in a company called MPression Entertainment, now defunct. Our business plan was to provide video on demand to hotels using set top boxes and movies stored locally at the hotel. The catch was that it was to be funded by advertising, some of which would be on demand to the hotel guest. The pitch was that the hotel guest could request a video ad, adn they'd get credits for free movies and other rewards. Sadly the company went belly up when the CEO was shipped off to federal prison. You can't win 'em all. :P

Anyway, the "reward" bit is one thing sorely missing from Tivo's new venture. What value, beyond possible entertainment, does the customer get from viewing the videos? They can get video entertainment elsewhere (on their own Tivo box, for goodness sake) so why give benefit to Tivo and the advertisers by watching them? It makes no sense...

Re:We never watch commercials

[tylernt]

"If I need to buy something, I will do my own research. I resent having information force fed to me.. even if it is information that I will eventually want."

My sentiments exactly. Unfortunately, it seems we are in the minority. Like spammers, advertisers get monetary rewards for intrusive advertising because there are just enough suckers out there to make it profitable. The rest of us suffer for it.