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Freeview versus TiVo is just a smoke-screen

By Ty Pendlebury on 07 April 2008

commentary So, we're to understand that TiVo is doomed and now

Big in the UK, there are moves to bring Freeview to Australia .

The combined Fin Review/MISAustralia website is reporting that Harvey Norman has refused to stock Seven's AU$500 set top box and the company has been "forced" to rethink its plans. While the article quotes Seven, nowhere does the representative say the company is "rethinking" and there is a liberal sprinkling of "understood to haves" in the text.

Let's do a show of hands.

Hands up people who've heard of TiVo. (I'm betting most regular readers of this site.)

Hands up if anyone not from the UK has heard of Freeview. (The sound of crickets. Someone coughs.)

Sure, with a bit of marketing the Freeview name could gain some traction, but why bother when a free EPG already exists in Australia and has for several months.

For those who don't know, Freeview is the UK's name for its EPG service. It is being pushed by all the local stations as a potential alternative to the TiVo subscription service that Seven will be launching this year. But surely there's already some competition in this field?

Topfield, the maker of set-top boxes, has had set-top boxes for years with TiVo-like facilities — thanks to the ICETV program guide. Same too Microsoft's Media Center. But are either household names? We don't believe so.

Which next-gen recorder are you interested in?

Freeview
2 votes

 

TiVo
4 votes

 

Foxtel iQ2
0 votes

 

I'm happy with my current recorder
0 votes

 

I don't know what the fuss is about
1 vote

 

Total votes: 7

As the Freeview "coalition of the willing" is apparently only meeting for the first time today, it's hard to say what sort of functionality its hardware will have. But it appears that the exercise will be in branding existing set top boxes in a similar way to the HD Ready campaign.

We're not apologists for TiVo, but we don't think it's an amazing idea, given that the marketplace is going to be crowded with plenty of different options come the middle of the year — Foxtel iQ2, TiVo, IceTV, etc. We don't think "branding" the already available EPG will make much of a difference to whether TiVo launches or not.

Seven will probably go ahead with TiVo just because it has brand awareness, and it will probably do okay. But it won't stop what is coming…

The commercial channels are scared of what Foxtel is capable of, and whether it's Freeview or TiVo, they want to ensure their advertising revenue does not erode. TV as we know it will be unrecognisable in ten years as online content begins to take over, and our little cottage industry is gearing up to defend itself. Inevitably, it's a war they will lose, and it probably won't be TiVo who wins it — it'll be to whoever can create a web-enabled set top box that's as intuitive as TV. And at the moment Foxtel will tell you it's them — but we think people will want a Joost-type service that's free.

Foxtel has shown that subscription TV is increasingly popular and Topfield/IceTV have made a living selling the exact same thing that TiVo is promising — fee-based program guides and "record anywhere" Internet functionality. We think that Freeview and TiVo can co-exist and that people will pay for convenience. We believe that this fabricated 'war' is really a smokescreen for a little fisticuffs: free-to-air versus Foxtel. But things won't really get interesting until the showdown: local television versus the world.

For the latest information on this service, have a look at our guide entitled "What Is Freeview?"

Topics: foxtel, iq2, tivo, freeview, epg, hd, cache, cms, lib, home

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Comments (40)

  • Blair Rightsfield commented on 18/06/2009 17:16 Report abuse

    Does anyone know about the new freeview channels? Will we have to have a HD TV to get them?

  • Frustrated-Again commented on 11/05/2009 15:25 Report abuse

    Oi! What about those of us who dont want to record a damn thing? Once again the country people have been left out of any consideration with this issue despite what anyone says....Its taken YEARS to get even a reasonable picture out in the near country South Aust and not without amplifiers and expensive special antennas and extremely high towers. Now, yet again, we are being left out in the cold when all we want is to sit down and watch the news with some kind of decent picture and possibly the odd movie or show to view and what do we get? More runaround. We now have to spend hundreds of more dollars and all we get is more confusion and more intense 'BS' and more run around. The people who write the articles in here should be ashamed of themselves writing such tripe and expecting people to swallow it. Its freeview as long as we spend $500 for this and $250 for that along with $700 for something else and Oh,, lets not forget about the new antenna shall we? What a lorry load of crock. You selfish mob of yobbos. Try thinking outside your own flamin square for once.

  • Me? Confused? Oh, yes! commented on 06/05/2009 01:33 Report abuse

    New channels? Which ones? ABC2 - many repeats of ABC1 Seven - same as main except a few things Nine - same as main except a few things ONE - sport So? ??

  • jaydee commented on 03/05/2009 19:37 Report abuse

    none of this matters until they do something about the strength and quality of the digital signal. I'm in midtown Toowoomba, can't get local WIN at all, 10 comes and goes, 7, 2 and SBS are usually not bad. all are #$%^&& if the wind starts blowing.

  • robbo53 commented on 30/04/2009 15:15 Report abuse

    abc2 and ten sport

  • perth888 commented on 30/04/2009 00:31 Report abuse

    Will someone tell me what extra channels there are? I have the set top box and I'm still looking for them!?! I'll stick to Foxtel and my dvd recorder. Go the Force!

  • Kenniball commented on 09/04/2009 14:51 Report abuse

    I recently bought a TiVo and am very happy with it. As far as I am conserned the major advantage is that it has two HD tuners and recording programes in advance is so easy

  • ubiquitous commented on 05/04/2009 16:08 Report abuse

    I'm sure once they've figured it all out, they'll let us know...

  • shn commented on 19/02/2009 01:57 Report abuse

    whalanboy, no your sony dvd recorder does not provide an accurate and usable EPG, nor does it let you do stuff like season pass recording, suggestion recording, or remote access to set up recordings from the Internet. So give it a rest, your DVD recorder is basic at best.

  • whalanboy commented on 12/02/2009 17:00 Report abuse

    freeview ? it was always free to view! Tivo hmm only does what my sony dvd recorder has been doing for 2 yrs now but wait Tivo doesn't burn to dvd guess i wont need tivo so all parties trying to sell me stuff NO THANKS !

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