TiVo: Binge-Watching Before Streaming

[Amir Shoam]

Legends of Tech Before Netflix and streaming, TiVo quietly rewired how we watched TV by introducing pause, rewind, and binge habits we now take for granted. This is the story of the box that changed everything.

Read the full article here.

TiVo: Binge-Watching Before Streaming

 

[axiomatic13]

ReplayTV > TiVo. I'll die on this hill.

 

[hempy]

When I had TiVo (I actually had two as I had upgraded the older one), the sole thing I loved was the technology of skipping ads. Was it perfect, not all the time, but it was really convenient and nice to use. Though the biggest drawback at the time (and I'm assuming it's still the case) is the need to use a CableCard. My cable company (Cox) was phasing out supporting CableCards, and that was when I decided to stop using my TiVo, drop cable TV, and just went all streaming.

 

[GumbyHorse]

The other thing it did was kill V commercials. I bought my first Tivo in 1998 and have hardly seen any commercials since. This is both good and bad. My friends often comment on commercials and I can't relate because I haven't seen them.

 

[dirtyferret]

I loved my Tivo

 

[Hotlynx16]

Never had one because the price was too high for me!

 

[AnilD]

TiVo didn’t just invent the DVR, it reshaped how we interact with media and the time we spent watching, or browsing, etc., laying the foundation for streaming before that was a possibility.

The thumbs up/down system was an early take on algorithmic recommendations with good taste (for the most part)... I remember Netflix's version of this for recommending which movies/DVDs to send you was also a great discovery tool, again, before streaming.

 

[mosu]

The only thing that bothers me is why don't you let the expression "binge"to die together with the defunct Bing browser.

 

[CapNemo72]

ReplayTV > TiVo. I'll die on this hill.

They both died, not on a hill, but in a stream.

 

[Mark Fuller]

I used to be a tech support agent for both TIVO and Directv. I can tell you that what is here now is surely better, but when it was there, it performed an admirable job serving it's purpose.