Catching Up On The TiVo HME With A Series 3

October 30th, 2006 Davis Posted in Disclosure - I own stock in co. mentioned, TiVo, Web 2.0 |

TiVo or Not Hosted on Zooomr

Having never made the jump from the TiVo 1 to the TiVo series 2, I missed out on a lot. While the whole blogosphere was buzzing about the HME development contest, I could only scratch my head and pretend like I understood. Thinking back on when TiVo gave me the option to transfer my lifetime subscription on my series 1 to a series 2, I probably made a mistake not taking them up on the offer, but at the time, the series 2 didn’t have a dual tuner and I was already thinking HDTV, so I decided to wait and wait and wait.

Of course not making the jump means that I’ve missed out on TiVo to Go and TiVoBack along with a whole host of subtle upgrades to the system. Now that I’ve upgraded to a series 3, I still don’t have access to TiVo to Go or TiVoBack, but at least I’m able to play around with some of the HME applications that were developed over a year ago.

At first I wasn’t sure if a series 3 would work with Apps.TV, but I was pleasantly surprised to find out that not only did it work, but it was really easy to set up. All I needed to do was type in the code 209.97.196.52 under the add server menu and voila! I instantly had access to a whole suite of TiVo applications.

Most of the applications are pretty basic and offer limited web surfing, but they are still fun anyway. My favorite has to be a toss up between the LastFM plug in that lets me get LastFM onto my home theater system and the Hot or Not plugin pictured above. While TiVoPony’s video poker plugin is a lot of fun, given the odds on video poker, I would have prefered a Texas Hold Em’ plugin where I could gamble away my TiVo Reward points with other subscribers instead.

Ultimately, I’d love to see TiVo finish building out this “unofficial” site with a few more robust applications. While the games are fun and the Flickr plug in is nice, none of the plugins seem to work together. It would be nice to be able listen to LastFM while looking through Flickr photos or hotties on Hot or Not. It would also be nice to see other outside developers start building more applications for this. After trying out the technology, I immedietely wanted access to my sites, not just the ones that are included. I’ll take Zooomr over Flickr, Pandora over LastFM and Pick The Hottie over Hot or Not anyday.

While the HME functionality is a nice addition and I’m sure that I’ll make use of it, in the end it left me really wanting more. Instead of making it so difficult for outside developers to create plugins for TiVo, I’d much rather see TiVo introduce a browser that allows me to surf the entire internet from my remote. While I know that their research has suggested that the regular consumers don’t want this functionality, I would be willing to bet that anyone who is saavy enough to find Apps.TV in the first place does want it.

Instead of trying to protect their operating system from other advertisers, video sites and online games, I would love to see TiVo open up their box a bit and give me access to YouTube, the blogosphere and all of the online shopping sites from the comfort of my couch. If TiVo wanted to make me buy a special wireless keyboard or mouse to do this I would be fine with that, but the lack of internet access will be a big competitive disadvantage as Microsoft’s Media Center continues to gain in popularity and as Apple’s new iDongle comes out. While TiVo doesn’t like people to think about their DVR as a computer, deep down inside I know that it really is and if they want to make the jump from DVR to DMR, they need to find a way to open up their box to the entire web 2.0 culture.