TiVo and Yahoo! Collaborate to Offer Online Scheduling Through Yahoo! TV

By | November 7th, 2005 comments icon (6) Comments


yahoo tivo schedule graphicTiVo, the creator of and a leader in television services for digital video recorders (DVR), and Yahoo! Inc., a leading global Internet company, today announced that they will collaborate to offer TiVo’s online scheduling features on Yahoo! TV.

This offering from the two companies enables Yahoo! TV users to request, via TiVo’s scheduling technology, recordings of their favorite TV shows on their TiVo® Series2™ devices from anywhere they access Yahoo!. Subscribers with a TiVo Series2 box and a standard Yahoo! user ID may use the service starting today.

“Working with Yahoo! is another way for us to deliver the best way to watch television and give viewers control of the television experience,” said Tom Rogers, CEO of TiVo Inc. “Beginning today, we’re giving Yahoo! users — whether they’re at the office or away from home — the ability to easily schedule recordings for later viewing.”

“Yahoo! is the leading entertainment destination on the Internet with millions of monthly visitors seeking relevant information about their favorite television programs,” said David Katz, head of sports and entertainment for Yahoo!. “We are excited to further our mission of delivering what consumers want, when, how and where they want it.”

Yahoo! TV offers a variety of entertainment information, such as show times, program descriptions and cast photographs, as well as exclusive content from partners like “Entertainment Tonight” and Mark Burnett Productions, which produces “The Apprentice,” all in one convenient location. Now, consumers using Yahoo! TV can easily program their TiVo devices remotely to record that new show they read about or catch their favorite show they discovered is being re-aired. In the coming months, TiVo and Yahoo! will also make some Yahoo! services, including photos, traffic, and weather available as part of the TiVo service.

About Yahoo!
Yahoo! Inc. is the No. 1 Internet brand globally and the most trafficked Internet destination worldwide. Yahoo! provides online products and services essential to consumers’ lives, and offers a full range of tools and marketing solutions for businesses to connect with Internet users around the world. Yahoo! is headquartered in Sunnyvale, Calif.

About TiVo Inc.
Founded in 1997, TiVo pioneered a brand new category of products with the development of the first commercially available digital video recorder (DVR). Sold through leading consumer electronic retailers, TiVo has developed a brand that resonates boldly with consumers as providing a superior television experience. Through agreements with leading satellite and cable providers, TiVo also integrates its full set of DVR service features into the set-top boxes of mass distributors. TiVo’s DVR functionality and ease of use, with such features as Season Pass™ recordings and WishList® searches, has elevated its popularity among consumers and has created a whole new way for viewers to watch television. With a continued investment in its patented technologies, TiVo is revolutionizing the way consumers watch and access home entertainment. Rapidly becoming the focal point of the digital living room, TiVo’s DVR is at the center of experiencing new forms of content on the TV, such as broadband delivered video, music and photos. With innovative features such as, TiVoToGo™ and online scheduling, TiVo is expanding the notion of consumers experiencing “TiVo, TV your way.” The TiVo® service is also at the forefront of providing innovative marketing solutions for the television industry, including a unique platform for advertisers and audience measurement research. The company is based in Alviso, Calif.





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  • http://www.thomashawk.com Thomas Hawk

    Of course this service doesn’t work with either my Series One TiVo or my DirectTV TiVo (only a Series Two TiVo). But this shouldn’t be surprising.

    Note: Gartenberg says that this announcement is no big deal.

    I think you have to look at this thing in it’s infancy though and see if there is not something else that it might represent. Yahoo! recently has been more and more vocal about getting into the production and content business. Partnering with TV (with this remote record thing as the first step) could potentially represent a path for Yahoo! to the living room.

    The standalone HDTV dual tuner TiVo, supposedly due out mid next year, could be a blockbuster of a machine. It might be nice to get Yahoo! content that will be developed over the course of the next year over this box.

    Yahoo! should buy TiVo. TiVo has a poison pill in effect right now which would make it tough for anyone to buy them without paying up and their Board most likely feels that their stock is worth a heck of a lot more than it trades at today, but by allowing themselves to be bought by Yahoo! they would gain needed momentum, money and traction to really do this internet TV thing right.

  • http://www.atmasphere.net/wp Jonathan Greene

    I have no idea what the real plan might be, but it has to be considerably more than simply remote programming of the box. I mean, who cares that I can click a link in the Yahoo TV page and have it record on my Tivo. It’s nice, but hardly the first time you can do this with a PVR and really not something worthy of the hype.

    Now, what would be cool would be a feature that let you stream content from the box through Yahoo’s video platform. If you linked your Tivo to Yahoo and enabled remote access the other way you might be able to seriously shake up the nascent placeshifting market currently being driven by Sling Media and Orb Networks.

  • http://www.alexandergrundner.com Alexander Grundner

    Jonathan Greene said: I have no idea what the real plan might be, but it has to be considerably more than simply remote programming of the box. I mean, who cares that I can click a link in the Yahoo TV page and have it record on my Tivo. It’s nice, but hardly the first time you can do this with a PVR and really not something worthy of the hype.

    Really… what other mainstream web portal allows members to seemlessly program their DVR from within their services besides Remote Record via MSN? To tech gurus, this might not be a big deal, but to normal folks this is a Yahoo! value-add service with literally minimal setup — just type in your “valid TiVo user account” and you’re done (MSN Remote Record requires a How-To to get things going). That’s the kind of simplicity that is a big deal, IMHO.

    However, I agree with your second point that if Yahoo used its streaming video platform to serve up content from our home devices they would definitely “shake up” the place-shifting market. Who knows… Yahoo and TiVo’s next announcement may be just that.

  • http://www.atmasphere.net/wp Jonathan Greene

    no argument on the value add service, but you can remote program your TiVo today. TitanTV lets you remote program an ElGato system as well. I believe AOL had previously announced something like this for TiVo users as well.

    There are much cooler and richer things that could be coming from this…

  • http://www.alexandergrundner.com Alexander Grundner

    Right, but with these types of services, features come in baby steps. But now you got me thinking…. Should web services release on a per feature basis or wait to bring a comprehensive feature-set like the ones most of the nay-sayers are requesting?

    Side note: I think it would be great if Yahoo would let you configure their TV service to work with multiple software and platform vendors. Just like it asks you which cable or satellite provider you use, they can ask you which device or PVR platform you would like to use the service with — that would be a nice next step. But I can see how it would make more sense to stick with one platform and expand its capabilities with help from the vendor.

  • http://www.atmasphere.net/wp Jonathan Greene

    This is all still early adopter, niche stuff so why not go for the full deal.

    My parents have no interest in this… still way too geeky.