I recently switched to Verizon Fios TV & Internet. The entire process of acquiring CableCard(s) and getting the unit setup is a chore even for the technically literate, but what’s worse is the fact that you can’t take full advantage of the On-Demand and built-in features of Fios TV. Those two issues alone are enough to kill a large % of market share. Sure… we all know the cable industry is dragging their feet on CableCard 2.0 but the average consumer could care less. They want a box they plug in, turn on, and go. Anything less creates barriers that will continue to erode TiVo’s market share.

I suspect TiVo will eventually have to make a strategic move with one of the major cable or satellite providers in order to add value to both companies. They’re already working closely with Comcast with the upgraded (albeit underpowered) DVR’s, so time will tell.

Just today I received an extortion letter from Cox stating that I am going to loose some of the channels I watch as they switch to Switched Digital Video services, something they are already using to deny consumers access to video content on their own terms using a TiVo.

James

Their hardware sales are now simply a holding action. They added all of 19,000 net new subscribers in the past year from their own hardware sales.

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/080305/aqw067a.html?.v=1

I’m convinced that continuing the hardware sales is designed to give them bargaining leverage for both the patent suit and any potential software IP licensing deals, as well as perhaps a sale of the company for its IP.

i’d like to first point out that Fios is already offering quite a bit of content on demand, already included in its monthly subscription fee, so we see that trend happening. also, Mr. Bewkes from TWC has mentioned that he’d like to see everything go VOD, so i dont think it’s too far fetched that we’ll see that

in terms of pricing, i agree that some people may want premium service but your car analogy is off base in my opinion. if you look at cable/telecom, they are in a battle for market share, and a large part of it is based upon pricing.

i’m not going to argue that there are more capabilities from TiVo, but there isn’t enough of a difference to sustain/become a leader.

DVR is simply too easily distributed and accessible, and for a casual TV viewer it’s more than enough. Sure there will be that niche group of TV watchers that need TiVo, but I don’t know that it’s enough in the long run.

I say we need a TiVO for Web TV, IPTV, Mobile TV, we need more Slingbox-ish services bundled into TiVO, and in general…TiVO needs to acknowledge its forte(a very cool service) and capitalize on it horizontally + vertically.

The DVR market is growing rapidly. TiVo may never be the market share leader, but there is room to be a premium product at the high end of the market. There are many people, myself included, willing to pay more for a better experience. And that’s been TiVo’s new course – they’ve dropped subsidies on their boxes and are focusing on the TiVo HD with a $300 MSRP. When they sell it direct it has no subsidy, and only a small subsidy at retail. Sure, this has slowed subscriber growth in TiVo-owned subs, but it has decreased SAC. Each new sub is more profitable for TiVo, and they’ve slashed losses, and are projecting a positive EBITDA for the first fiscal quarter.

And even at the low end TiVo still has a play – their OCAP software for Comcast & Cox. It has just started rolling out, and it has the potential to put TiVo into a lot of homes. Revenue isn’t as high as on the standalone subs, but revenue is revenue. And the international markets are another are with a lot of potential. TiVo now has DVB-T hardware (also capable of DVB-S), and they’ve internationalized their OS to support English, French, Germany, Spanish, and Italian as interface languages, with the ability to add others.

Wei-Der – Unless OnDemand pricing comes WAY down, it won’t replace linear content. It would cost me several times as much as what I pay each month for cable and TiVo to watch all of my content OnDemand. And OnDemand doesn’t offer me the same capabilities as TiVo – such as stopping a program when I get tired and watching the rest the next day, or even days later. As for FiOS – FiOS is just another content provider like a cable system. In fact, they support CableCARD and you can use TiVo with FiOS – many people do.

Online video often doesn’t often the same quality as cable content – and rarely does it offer true HD content. (And none of the download services – Apple TV, Xbox Live, VUDU, etc – offer quality HD either, they all over-compress it to reduce download sizes.) I want to see quality content on my 61″ 1080p screen, on my schedule. TiVo is the highest quality solution available today, and for the foreseeable future, IMHO.

At the end of the day, it is about viewing television, and with WebTV and Fios TV providing the same advantages, it is only a matter of time before TiVo dies (barring a significant partnership or technological breakthrough)

The day will come when everything is on-demand at a nominal fee. I imagine that only gives TiVo a few years to get its act together.