Tivo goes anti-customer in a show of stupidity

[Mr Peabody]

I heard Tivo plans to download to subscribers receivers a program that if you fast forward through commercials a billboard advertisement will show up on your screen. I don't have all the particulars of how this works exactly but if you don't read or accept the advertisement your personal information could possibly be given out. I haven't seen this in print for I am not a Direct TV subscriber but a very reliable source, a radio talk show host, was talking about this on his show. Apparently he is a Tivo user and seemed to be highly upset over the whole deal. I haven't seen anything this stupid happen to a paying customer since AOL decided to start spamming their own subscribers.

[N. Abstentia]

Looks like bunk, sounds like bunk, smells like bunk....guess what!?!?

Sounds like whoever told you that is a little to paranoid, as that's highly illegal.

AOL however, I would expect that from.

[plextor guy]

I can't imagine anything short of legislation or lawsuits would prompt Tivo to do this. It can't be a suprise though. Tivo, Replay and others completely undermine the business model of advertising supported programming. Something had to give.

[eisforelectronic]

Time Warner's dvr originally had a commercial skip feature, but the powers that be weren't too happy.

[kexodusc]

Worst case scenario, doesn't sound that bad...fast forward until the show starts and be done with it...a few half second clicks is better than waiting through 3 minutes of junk.
The industry is mostly paid for by adverstising revenues, so this kind of thing is to be expected. We're getting a little greedy if we expect NBC to pay millions to make shows, and then choke off their revenues too.

[Lensman]

But it's an opt-in option, with the consumer's permission only.

Here's a report on how it works from the Los Angeles Times:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-et-tivo17nov17,0,3236496.story