TiVo is beginning to test hosted Home Media Engine (HME) applications as described in this recent email correspondence (via Digg, 8bit_Hero). FYI, I did not receive the email and I am not part of the Beta group. Hi there! Thanks for filling out the beta application at www.tivo.com, we appreciate your interest in TiVo’s Beta Programs! When you [...]

The National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA) has provided a CableCARD status report to the Federal Communications Comission. For the most part the association documents the adoption rate, consumer costs, rate of incidents, and other metrics of current CableCARDs amongst the top cable providers. However, the more interesting news is the status of CableCARD 2.0 [...]

The Slingbox crew just released version 1.05 (beta) of Sling Player, the PC desktop client for controlling and watching your video feed. Jeremy Toeman, VP of Product Management, elaborates on the update:The geniuses in our engineering department have figured out how to squeeze even more throughput out of your network connections, which results in streaming improvements [...]

You know it's inevitable... all content across all media will be locked down. ReplayTV is next up as their parent company is licensing encryption technology from Certicom. As Tivo To Go files are encrypted, so too shall ReplayTV's. The race is on - will the DRM arrive before ReplayTV is sold off like Rio? I'm [...]

PC Magazine's John C. Dvorak blames societal problems on large hard drives and TiVo. Afterall it couldn't have anything to do with ranting and raving columnists, right? PC Mag says: With the TiVo, you don't have to pay close attention to your TV anymore. If something happens, you can simply go back to watch it [...]

Earlier this year Micke Langberg launched Rent my DVR, an online marketplace to buy and sell television programming. By scanning a web listing of television shows, one chooses what they’d like to receive. If a request is filled, the show can be downloaded for about 25 cents through a custom “P2P” application. Conversely, a person [...]

PC Magazine reviewed 5 DVR software packages (issue dated 10/04/05) as alternatives to Microsoft’s Windows Media Center Edition (MCE). All were deemed good values and worthy competitors of TiVo… assuming you have an extra computer with decent specs. Meedio Pro earned an Editors’ Choice award and was followed closely by Snapstream’s BeyondTV bundle. Bill Howard [...]

First Macrovision DRM, now this… TiVo has gone the route of most cell phone providers with their updated service agreement. They’ll sell you hardware at a loss, but guarantee themselves service revenue to recoup those expenses. If you cancel service within a year of activating your unit, you’ll be penalized $150. No caveat for multi-TiVo [...]