TiVo brings web content to TVs in bid for living room supremacy

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Wednesday, 15 November 2006 22:59

Your IT - Entertainment

Anyone wanting to watch videos downloaded from the Internet on their TVs either need a nice big flat screen plasma or LCD TV with a VGA (or better) plug, or an Xbox 360 or PS3. But while selected high-end iPods and Nokia phones have allowed TV viewing for some time, TiVo’s plans to let users effortlessly share homemade content sets it apart from the rest.

In a bid to remain relevant in an era where the Xbox 360 can now, at least in the US, download TV shows, Hollywood movies and even some content in HD, with the PS3 slated to offer the same capabilities and Apple due to launch the iTV in 2007, linked to iTunes as the download store, the TiVo needed to do something different.

And different this is, with the ability for TiVo users to upload content to a website called One True Media. Invite other TiVo users with the compatible updated system software, and they can subscribe to a private channel to have your content recorded to TiVo to watch anytime. It’s distribution of content for the TiVo owning masses, direct to TVs in living rooms!

It makes you wonder who will be the first user-generated content TiVo star, lending itself towards major shades of Youtube. Perhaps the public will come to think of it at TubeTiVo or something equally silly/catchy.

Some of the mooted uses include easily giving private access to the grandparents to see videos of the kids having fun. School football teams can give access to TiVo users to see their matches. Watch vodcasts on a real TV when at home instead of on a small screen.

You can transfer unprotected content you’ve download from the Internet to direct to the TiVo to watch on your TV, with special transcoding software able to handle QuickTime, Windows Media Video and MPEG-4 and to transfer it to TiVo’s NTSC MPEG-2 format.  

TiVo want to make watching web video as easy as watching TV, while letting you actually watch it on the TV too. The service is free to existing users while new users will have to pay $24.95 for the new software.

Other new channels of content include deals with television companies such as CBS and a new channel where selected celebrities trade on their fame and fortune to ‘take you to the movies’. All of these extra services are meant to differentiate TiVo from the others and keep in the race in the fight against the Xbox 360 and the PS3 taking over.

With the Xbox 360 now able to stream video as well as audio on regular Windows XP computers, a feature that was previously only available to Windows Media Center users, and with millions of Windows XP computers out there, with all kinds of video content already loaded and downloaded onto them, the Xbox 360 threatens to be a big competitor in that area alone, not just in its new ability to directly download commercial TV shows and movies.

How soon Microsoft moves to offer a similar feature to the TiVo for Xbox 360 users is unknown, as are Sony’s plans in this area. But if TiVo is successful, it’s a feature the games console manufacturers cannot ignore.

Everyone wants to replicate Youtube’s success of endless visitors in the gadzillions, but they want to make a regular, profitable revenue stream out of it, too.

After all, not everyone can expect Google to come rushing with a big US $1.6 billion offer. These days you need to make your own luck, and TiVo is well on the way to doing that.