Camelot One
Premium,MVM
join:2001-11-21
Sarasota, FL
clubs: | And here it comes....
The open door for the next company to completely crush TIVO. If I wanted ads, I wouldn't have bought a TIVO box. Period. |
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Wills
join:2001-01-03
Port Charlotte, FL | Don't sweat it. Give it a week and people will figure out how to disable it. Just like everything else they've thrown down the pike.
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I have a shaved head, a goatee, and tatoos. Don't you realize the rules don't apply to me. |
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Mactron
el camino Real
Premium
join:2001-12-16
CM94sv | reply to Camelot One
Sadly my first Tivo will be my last. |
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Sysadmin
NoBama
Premium,MVM
join:2000-07-07
Sacramento, CA
 ·Pacific Bell - SBC
| reply to Camelot One
I don't think a small banner is that bad either. If this quote is right I can easily ignore it or add the 30 second skip if that helps to bypass it.
said by from PVRBlog:
Posted by: Brian at August 3, 2005 03:51 PM
For those of you who don't have TiVo, "normal sized thumbs up" means it's quite small and in the upper right hand corner of the screen. It covers maybe 1/16th of the screen, sort of like a moderately more obtrusive version of those now-very-common network watermarks. The screenshot makes it look almost like it's covering the whole screen.
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The hardest thing in the world to understand is income tax. Albert Einstein. |
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Annon Tivo
@pegs.com
| reply to Camelot One
Why everyone complains about ads i will never know. You can not tell me with a straight face the whole reason you bought a tivo was to skip ads. Thats complete bs and you and i know it, just like everyone else in the forum.
You bought tivo for the whole purpose of time shifting your material so you can watch it at a later date.
If you bought it to just skip ads you a fool and wasted your money. TIVO can and will do so much more. |
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djrobx
join:2000-05-31
Valencia, CA
 ·PHONE POWER
 ·AT&T U-Verse
·AT&T CallVantage
·Time Warner VOIP
 ·RoadRunner Cable
2 edits | Well, TiVo's advertising campaign was "Skip the stuff you don't want to see". Yes, people DO, in fact, use TiVo to skip ads. I always do something else, waiting 15 minutes into a show before watching just so I can skip the ads.
Part of it is that TiVo is falling down a slippery slope.
First it was the star ads. TiVo swore up and down that it would not get worse. Now they've turned to banner ads (and they've tested some that consumed a good portion of the screen, not like that teeny little ad in the screenshot).
How long will it be until they insert ads in the guide? The Pick Programs to Record area? Ads that you can't fast forward through? Are they going to start charging even more money if you want to opt out of them? I understand TiVo needs to make money to survive, but slapping ads all over it rightfully turns the stomachs of many.
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\\ROB - a part of the SCB local network |
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n2jtx
join:2001-01-13
Glen Head, NY
·Optimum Online
| reply to Annon Tivo
said by Annon Tivo:
Why everyone complains about ads i will never know. You can not tell me with a straight face the whole reason you bought a tivo was to skip ads. Thats complete bs and you and i know it, just like everyone else in the forum. Skipping ads was probably reason #2, after timeshifting, why I bought my first VCR back in the early 1980's. For me, the problem with ads now is there are to damn many of them. Back in the 60's and early 70's, you had perhaps one minute of commercials at a break. No big deal. Now they waste anywhere from three to seven minutes of your life at a break and skipping has become a necessity. I remember about four or five years ago, the Sci-Fi channel was going to air all of the original Star Trek episodes unedited in their original broadcast length. Only problem was that with todays normal commercial breaks inserted, the 1960's programs would run about one hour and fifteen minutes. Go back to the old break lengths, quintuple the fees the advertisers pay to make up for it, and maybe skipping will be more hassle than it's worth.
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I support the right to keep and arm bears. |
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banditws6
Shrinking Time and Distance
join:2001-08-18
Naples, FL
·Comcast
| said by n2jtx  :I remember about four or five years ago, the Sci-Fi channel was going to air all of the original Star Trek episodes unedited in their original broadcast length. Only problem was that with todays normal commercial breaks inserted, the 1960's programs would run about one hour and fifteen minutes. Go back to the old break lengths, quintuple the fees the advertisers pay to make up for it, and maybe skipping will be more hassle than it's worth. You're right about break lengths. I remember this as well. They had to devote 1.5 or 2 hours to each Star Trek episode just to fit it in (although granted, they also had commentary from Shatner and Nimoy between acts). Whenever I would see a local channel airing TOS before Sci-Fi bought up the rights, the channel would have to step on the show (cut scenes immediately prior to or after a commercial) in order to stuff all the advertising in, and that's even above and beyond the syndication cuts Paramount already made in the '60s to allow for the original commercials.
Primetime shows are the worst. Sometimes you'll have five minutes of ads, then one of the show's acts will only last ten minutes before you get more commercials.
For me, the reason I bought a TiVo was also mostly for time-shifting, but the commercial skipping ability has become my second favorite feature. With that said, I don't mind them putting small ad banners (like the one in the screenshot seen here, NOT those huge ones demoed a few months ago) up while I'm fast-forwarding. As long as I'm still able to fast-forward, and the picture isn't obscured by an ad (else, how am I supposed to see when to stop fast-forwarding?).
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"I'll follow the law until it's just stupid." -Ted Nugent |
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grumpygeek
join:2004-12-14
Houston, TX
| I bought a Tivo for exactly the same reason - I like watching what I want, when I want. Tampon commercials and dissertations on fungus medications are not included in "what I want to watch".
Commercials have been almost identical in proportion to show times - 9 minutes for a 30-minute show, 18-19 minutes for a 60-minute show, for several decades. The advertisers have gotten smarter about how to place them, though - that's why you'll see a 6-minute break right before some important plot twist, instead of a four-minute break 10 minutes before it.
One thing to keep in mind is that the networks exist to sell commercial advertising; their method for selling that advertising is to surround it with programming that will catch eyeballs. |
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vonslatt
join:2001-07-17
Burlington, MA
| reply to Mactron
As long as I can see enough of the program when fast forwarding to know when to hit "play" I don't care what Tivo does with the rest of the screen.
But then, I'm a stockholder! 
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Jake.
»www.vonslatt.com |
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tbeckner
join:2004-03-20
Bend, OR
| said by vonslatt :As long as I can see enough of the program when fast forwarding to know when to hit "play" I don't care what Tivo does with the rest of the screen. But then, I'm a stockholder! But why use fast forwarding, 30 second skip works better, even after 6.2 which has seemed to break 8 second backskip. |
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maartena
Stacked.
Premium
join:2002-05-10
Orange, CA
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to Camelot One
said by Camelot One :The open door for the next company to completely crush TIVO. If I wanted ads, I wouldn't have bought a TIVO box. Period. Its a little pricey, but since you don't need a monitor really and you can use it for any feature you would like besides DVR, you can make a kick-ass DVR with multiple tuners by building a PC with 2 TV cards, a good powerful videocard, a large harddrive, a $20 firewire card if you want to add more drivespace in the future, and the possibility to record everything on a DVD for roughly $1,000 to $1,500, depending on how high-end you want to go.
Don't really need a monitor, although a $199 15" TFT screen for extra information may be nice. Hook the bad boy up to your TV and you are all set. You can buy HDTV, Digital TV cards these days, and on top of all of it if you attach a joystick to the machine you can use it as your very own PC-Gaming console in the livingroom!
And you get to pick what software you use. You can even make a Linux Box and skip Microsoft's Media Center Edition and build a machine from scratch using Linux freeware and open sourse products.
A remote control set for PC's is $50 or so. Maybe $100 if you want a fancy one.
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And i'm right. I'm always right, but this time I'm a little more right then I usually am. |
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mwhitted
join:2001-12-09
Grand Rapids, MI
| reply to Mactron
said by Mactron :Sadly my first Tivo will be my last. Curious... what are you going to use instead of TiVo? And why? |
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Mactron
el camino Real
Premium
join:2001-12-16
CM94sv
| Ads !!! and any other DVR that doesn't display Ads ! 
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If only the Verizon CSRs worked this well. |
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Marckus0513
Just Because
join:2003-01-11
Vernon, VT
·Verizon Online DSL
| reply to Camelot One
I have had TIVO for 2 years now and love it. I love the season pass feature. I use it to record the shows I like so I can watch them when I have time. Yes, the fact that I can FF over the commercials is awesome and I use it all of the time. However, this new thing TIVO is doing placeing banners on the screen when I FF thru the commercials does not bother me in the least bit. Lets get real...WHO CARES!!!!!!! You guys make it seem like these banner ads are going to permanently harm you or something. Yes, we pay 13 bucks a month for the service, but that is for far more than strictly the ability to FF thru commercials. Hey, guess what, we are still able to FF thru commercials guys. So what if you see a banner ad on the screen along with the commercials zipping past. It will still take the same amount of time to get to the next part of the program you are watching as it did before. So its not like you will have to waste one more milli-second watching your program than you did before (heaven forbid).
In reality it appears that the only thing you guys really have to complain about is the principle of it all. Big deal, occasionally there is a commercial I might like to get more info on anyways. Like it or not it is the commercials that pay for the TV we have today, and for many of the other things we anjoy today free or not. Hey, if TIVO needs to make a little more money to survive and improve their service go for it. The networks are certainly putting more and more commercials into that 60 minute time span and less programming. Face it people, some sort of commercials or ads are everywhere you look!! Noone seems to think twice about paying 10 bucks or more to go see a movie at a theater. Hmmmm, lets see, first I get to see the theaters ads for their overpriced popcorn and candy, then I get to watch 10 minutes or more of trailers which are nothing more than entertaining ads, then the movie...but wait!!! More and more movies have nicely placed products that are just begging me to buy them. I pay quite a bit of money a month for my CATV service yet 25% or more of the programming is advertisements.
If you guys are willing to give up the great features that TIVO has to offer because of a few seconds (literally) of having to see a banner ad during your FF operation then go for it. One of two things is going to happen. Either we put up with commercials of some type or we are all going to be paying a ton of money for commercial free TV. I prefer the TIVO way myself and will continue to use my TIVO and pay for it even with the commercial banners.
Relax people...Everything is going to be alright!!
Marckus  |
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coffaro
Moonie
Premium
join:2003-07-05
Arlington, TX
clubs:
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to mwhitted
REPLAY......... |
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