We've been thinking about getting TiVO/ReplayTV. Mostly because of many failed recordings on our VCRs, or the quickly fading recording quality of a 10-month old Sony, or the hassles of rewinding at the last minute. Today's VCRs, though they are inexpensive, are also cheap. Especially when compared to some of the 10-year old relics still functioning around our house. They were built like tanks and last like them. No longer. Your basic, under-$100 VCR from Best Buy is a piece of junk.Hence the flirtation with TiVO. I'm still vacillating on the purchase because of several factors, one of which is the onerous subscription fee. It adds roughly $300 to the cost of the recorder (as a one-time fee) or a monthly fee in the $10-12 range. Not an insignificant cost once you factor in satellite or cable service, not to mention any premium programming like HBO. The "lifetime", one-time-only fee will pay for itself in about two years, but there is a rub. It's not for your lifetime, silly. It's for the lifetime of a specific machine. So what happens if the machine dies after the warranty runs out? Uh, apparently you're stuck. So the true cost of a TiVO/ReplayTV is much higher. Then there is the nagging question of your fortunes being tied to those of a single company. Suppose they change the terms of use after you sign up? Suppose SonicBlue goes SonicBellyUp? One thing we know is that these machines strike fear in the heart of the entertainment industry because they wrest control from corporate bozos and place it where it should be: in the hands of viewers. Forget scheduling machinations and commercials. A digital video recorder renders them moot. The studios and networks are scared. Hence the many lawsuits filed against SonicBlue, whose ReplayTV not only has the standard DVR features, but can actually stream video over Ehternet to another machine in your house, or across the planet. So now the entertainment industry, unable to pull a Napster-like ploy to make DVRs illegal, has fired back with a "solution". Voila, AOL-Time Warner's Mystro TV. Ostensibly, this DVR has functionality similar to TiVO/ReplayTV. Except... the networks determine which shows can be recorded, or time-shifted. One proposed "feature" will display commercials whenever a viewer pauses the machine. In other words, AOLTW has control over your viewing habits, not you. How typical that this idiotic idea comes from AOL, home of the Internet-on-training-wheels approach. Dan Gillmor says, This is how the entertainment cartel plans to "compete" with hard disk video recorders: Prevent customers from doing what they want. More to the point, he emphasizes the seemingly obvious (yet incomprehensible to them) problem confronting the entertainment industry -- alienating the very customers you seek.The day is coming when time-shifting your favorite TV show will be an artifact of history. This will reduce the audience for television, but the control freaks who run the cartel continue to be oblivious to reality. That's a bit melodramatic. For now. But it will be interesting to see if the TV cartel can paralyze the industry as effectively as have their colleagues in the music industry.
9:54:04 AM 
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