If I have a show recorded, Tivo should help me find back-episodes I might have missed (e.g. from Amazon, or other on-demand service) directly from the Info page for that show. (Don’t make me load the Amazon VOD home page, and enter the search myself)

I note my H.253 error. I was an insomniac last night, sitting in front of Tivo watching Charlie Rose at 3:30 a.m. with only the flicker of the TV guiding me.

I also note that your blog (or Firefox) remembered my comment details this time – didn’t have to retype them this time. Yeah!

Of course, this won’t happen under the free, ad-based model. My guess is they strike a partnership with a TiVo and charge $9.99/mo. to access Hulu via the device on your TV.

TiVo shouldn’t be trying to charge extra fees for Sling or TiVo in the hotels, they need to make their technology free so that everyone will try it. All it takes is about two days and you’re hooked. Those extra subscribers would be worth more then the nickel and dime fees they’d earn off of access charges. If you order from Amazon, you can link it to a credit card, but if you want to buy from someone else, you have to re-enter new payment. Dominoes only takes cash through TiVo.

The need to buy DivX is that it would be a cheap play and a way for TiVo to start to profit from other areas of the industry. If you strip out DivX’s cash they would actually cost closer to $30 million and they are doing $60 – $80 million in high gross margin sales. Their expertise would also help fine tune TiVo’s own licensing business. DivX is a company that could be fixed very easily with the right ownership. As far as H.264 goes, I agree that its the future and would point out that DivX owns the top H.264 company through their MainConcept purchase. Just because digital is the future doesn’t mean people will stop renting DVDs from Netflix. DivX is an aging technology, but it will prove more sticky then DVD.

Hulu on TiVo would be a tough sell and joining with old media would have distinct pros and cons for TiVo. There is a lot that TiVo could do if they didn’t have to worry about licensing restrictions. From using digital video to fill missing shows from season passes to sharing content with a headset like you suggested. They could also fine tune the direct purchase model by working with content creators at the product placement level.

The downside to working with big media is that they are an oligarchy and TiVo would have to fight for every restriction that they wanted lifted. There is a lot of freedom in being able to be independent.

How about TiVonLive – makes a perfect combination TiVo+Onlive. Unlikely to happen given OnLive’s Steven Perlman’s connection to Moxi, but I like the idea.

I want my SlingTiVo to be viewable in a hotel. Perhaps a hotel could charge me some hourly fee to TiVocatch my TiVoslung content while I’m on the road.

Since I live in Canada, I’ve never had the privilege to purchase anything through my Tivo. The model you suggest for purchasing through TiVo is the model I had assumed they used. Are you saying that each time a user purchases something through their TiVo they have to type out their credit card info and personal details for every single piece of content / pizza they order. Kinda sounds like the process I go through every time I leave a comment on DavisFreeberg.com (OK, I couldn’t resist!)

Whats with the need to buy Divx? We already have a global digital standard – its called H.264. It’s implemented on AppleTV, the Xbox 360, the PS3, iTunes, QuickTime, Windows Media Player. That boat has saled. TiVo already has a built in H.264 decoder in the S3 and HD TiVos. They just need to turn it on.

And while on the topic of H.264, if a podcast is available in H.253 format, let me subscribe to it directly on my TiVo, without any damn walled garden limitation and without having to go through the TiVo Desktop. Either that or make it as butt-simple to access podcasta on TiVo as it is to access them on AppleTV. Ever since I purchased my AppleTV I don’t watch video podcasts on my TiVo any more. It’s WAY too hard compared to AppleTV.

And who the hell needs YouTube in a TiVo anyway? I watch my YouTube vidoes where they belong – linked into blog posts! Who watches YouTube videos on their TiVo.

I like the Pages idea, but I want TiVo to open up their system via APIs so ANYONE can publish video content through it and charge whatever they want. I want free and unfettered competition in the video/movie/TV distribution model. Like video podcasts, I want the ability to type in my chosen video provider, access it through TiVo and buy away – with TiVo getting a cut of every sale made through it, or a cut of the advertising if free content flows through it.

Hulu on TiVo seems unlikely since the Hulu oligarch is playing hardball with Boxee. Yes, it would be wonderful, but we are dealing with an industry intent on shooting it self in the foot for as long as they can weedle every last penny out of their customers – not realizing that in the process they are alienating customers permanently (this said from a guy who cut off his cable last March and never intends to subscribe again).

How about adding a function where I can watch TV shows/movies with another TiVo user at the same time with a headset – like I’ll soon be able to do on the 360? Virtual TV watching. Not sure how to make money off it, but I like the idea. One side or the other controls the remote and you watch together. I guess you’d need the TiVo-Onlive box first to have a headset. Which reminds me. I don’t ever remember seeing a headset with any of the OnLive coverage last May. Humm? How you gonna blast your friends through OnLive without a headset for trash talking.

Good, thought provoking post Davis!