If anyone’s still looking: TiVo just got great

TiVo has had a lot of bad word of mouth over the past couple of years. Most of it deserved. And yes, much of it from me.

Launching a set-top box that lacked an electronic programming guide (EPG) for one of the major free-to-air channels, Prime (think: test rugby delayed coverage, Dr Who, Top Gear, Downton Abbey etc etc) was questionable.

The companies behind TiVo in this part of the world never realised what an issue this was, because they  didn’t use their own product. Managers at Hybrid TV (the on-third TVNZ owned Australasian TiVo licensee) lived on the other side of the Tasman. At exclusive TiVo retailer Telecom, they watched Sky TV.

A second problem: slim content on TiVo’s pay-per-view download service, Caspa. To top things off, Caspa was slower and buggier than download alternatives like Apple TV (which I turned to as a TiVo user).

Finally, TiVo get's Prime's EPG
There was good news last week (if totally unheralded), with TiVo finally getting Prime’s EPG. (A second missing EPG, from Maori TV was added late last year.)

At last, TiVo has become a fully functional digital recorder for those in the Freeview camp.

And this comes at a time when a TiVo box is now going for $299 – a third of its original price (Noel Leeming briefly had it at $199 over Christmas).

That’s great buying.

Especially when you consider TiVo’s got some great frills such as its predictive recording, it’s jump-back button (much easier than a rewind), support for copying recordings to a PC, and the ability to set recordings over the web.

TVNZ, Telecom long given up
Ironically, it comes at a time when TVNZ and Telecom have long lost interest in TiVo

TVNZ recently wrote off its $17.7 million investment, and has entered a joint venture with Sky TV, called igloo, whose paid download service will compete with TiVo’s Caspa.  in Hybrid TV.

Telecom, which used to feature TiVo displays at the front of many of its retail stores, now has little of no mention of the service. The telco has got back into bed with Sky TV.

Sky TV, now totally un-threatened, has finally agreed to provide Prime's EPG. Contacted by NBR late last week, Sky TV chief executive John Fellet reiterated his argument that his company was waiting for TiVo to be covered by Nielsen's rating survey - not something that prevented other Freeview-compatible set-top boxes from gaining access to Prime's EPG.

Caspa given up the ghost
All is not perfect in TiVo land.

But its value-add feature, the internet download service Caspa, has withered on the vine.

(At the time Hybrid TV owner Seven Media West announced TVNZ had bought a one-third interest, TVNZ said a third investor might also come onboard. Somewhere, in a parallel univese, that third investor was Telecom and together Telecom, TVNZ and Seven built Caspa into a serious pay TV an on-demand movie service that could challenge Sky TV. In dreary reality, of course, TVNZ and Telecom have shambled into the Sky TV monopoly camp.)

At one point, Caspa had a decent (or at least so-so) line up of movies, and even a few TV series available on-demand (iTunes NZ has none - though it's easy for New Zealanders to access the bountiful iTunes US).

As Friday last week, it was showing just four movies in its new release section, all of them obscure.

A spokesman could not immediately say if Caspa was being formally wound-down.

But it’s certainly plain that content deals with major studios have expired. And with TVNZ provisioning just $1.9 million for Hybrid/TiVo over the next four years, no major new deals will be signed.

Still, a TiVo set-top box is now great at its primary function: showing and recording Freeview HD channels. 

It looked like Bond&Bond was being used as a dumping ground when it started selling TiVo boxes at $299 over Christmas. But now – if you’re not in the Sky TV camp, go get one.