Is TiVo is our last hope? No. There is another ....

Progress made on the alternate EPG.  Fingers crossed that this all works out.  They're certainly putting the work in on it ....

Read about it (and a couple of screenshots) at http://tinyurl.com/altepg1

A little birdy tells me ....

A little birdy has passed on some information relating to TiVo and the UK. This person has a 'contact' (Mums friends workmates daughters liftshare's uncle or something) within TiVo and has usually been able to get interesting information.

Basically speaking, its probably not a lot more than already suspected, just confirmation that the exclusive deal with Virgin means there is absolutely no chance of any TiVo official developments in the future unless it's through VM. TiVo cited their decision to abandon the original service was partly due to other forces, not necessarily VM but they didn't elaborate on any further details. The person in question also noted that although previously they had been trusted with some quite privy information, things were very 'cagey' this time around, and he didn't really get told anything more. He also mentioned the following interesting point he found on a tech news site:

Last year TiVo lost $84.5 million and also ran up a deficit of $779.2 million, so the company is trying everything they can to stay afloat'.

so who knows, perhaps the VM customers may find themselves in a similar position before too long ....

It's all gone quiet over there ....

Well, we've launched the petition, twitter account and this blog, joined and advertised the Facebook group, and put the word around the forums.

We've tried our best to get some response from someone about the reasons behind it and/or a way to continue 'officially' but there's no responses as yet.  We've sent messages to the TiVo blog, the VP directly via Facebook, to VM, and even the 'knew it would be a waste of time' bskyb@tivo.com address (As advised by TiVo in their communications) and nothing has yet yielded any results.

I'm fresh out of ideas for anything else we can do, so if anyone has any, now's the time to speak up.

Could Virgin Media help?

An interesting comment made by someone on the forums who sent a letter to Virgin Media:
A guy from virgin media called me back the next day he said if they had any correspondence regarding Tivo and series 1 they had been speciffically advised to forward them to a dedicated vm team, and if we had enough people requiring another option to cable they would consider us and look to giving us a way forward.
The thread is here.  Whilst this simply may be corporate lip service I think it is best to investigate as many avenues as possible, so lets get writing to VM too.

However, there is no mention of an email address and a search on the Virgin Media site bears no fruit.  The only way to contact them seems to be through the complaint form for existing customers.  You can get to it here.  You can put 0 (zero) for the customer account number, the billing date and value fields do not seem to care what value you put in them as long as they are valid values (i.e. any date).

I think we need to explore this avenue, however unlikley it may be to get anything done.  So, using the form letter below for the details section (taken from Sailsey's post on the forum), get sending!! (and remember, you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, be nice!)

Dear Virgin Media 
I have had a wonderful experience with Tivo and BskyB lifetime subscription for a UK series 1 Tivo.  
I have been advised the service is being taken over by your company and was initially pleased that you seemed to be embracing a better way of watching TV, rather than stifling the marketing of this product, but the outcome seems to have been a sad end for me. 
Where I live Virgin Medias cable service is unavailable.  Would you please consider reviewing offering the service via some other source method?
There is a massive Tivo audience that have been given notice to be cut off from the update service.  Please reconsider offering dial up programme listing to existing Tivo customers, until you have a viable alternative for all the UK.
Thanks for your time. 
[Your name here] 
[Your contact email/phone here]
Loyal TiVo User

If you can, drop a comment so we know roughly how many have been sent.

An open letter to Joshua Danovitz

A few days back I composed an open letter to Joshua Danovitz, "GM/VP International TiVo" according to his blog http://blog.tivo.com/2011/02/1123/ where he announces the end of the EPG service.

Now on his blog there have been 167 comments to date with the only response by him (early on) being 'email bskyb' which is quite clearly nonsense as the service is still TiVo's responsibility.  This would appear to be a case of 'if you can't get Virgin cable and thus a TiVo, just get SKY+'.  A nice parting gift to BSkyB now that they have 'left' for Virgin.

I wasn't all that hopeful of a response, but as I found his personal profile on Facebook (here) I thought I'd send him a message.  When I first found this profile he still had the option for non-friends to send him personal messages.  This option has since disappeared so he obviously knows he's been found out and that people are extensively displeased with what's going on, but has decided that the people who have been loyal to TiVo in the UK are now just a nuisance.

To date I have had no response, so after some digging I intend to send it by email and also by snail mail to his office to ensure that he gets the message.

For the record, here's the letter

Joshua, 

You don't know me, but I suspect you already know what this message will be about.

I have been a loyal TiVO customer in the UK for a few years now, activley seeking out a box, even though they were discontinued, because I already knew that it was far superior to anything else on the market, and still is.

You must already know that dissatisfaction with TiVO's choice to cut the EPG service, which basically renders the series 1 units almost useless, is at a high level. The massive amount of comments in your blog and amount of aggrevied customers frequenting the TiVO forums shows you that you have chosen to simply turn your back on many loyal fans (of which in the UK you may need soon).

Regardless of all the arguments we have about exactly what is 'lifelong service', and the fact that half (49%) of the country cannot receive Virgin Media cable services, you have so far failed to actually answer the questions behind your reasoning for removing the service.

I would like therefore to ask you the following questions to which I, and other TiVO users would like a straight answer:

- Exactly whose decision was this to cut the service? TiVO? Was it part of your deal with Virgin Media? Is it down to BSkyB? Most people at the moment are assuming that its to do with your deal with Virgin, to try and push people that can get it onto the new TiVO box. Perhaps you can correct me?

- How did you come to this decision? Why now? Seems like strange timing, just as you launch a new product with a new partner? No?

- Did you ever consider that you could still make money from the S1 service? Many people, myself included, that have a lifetime subscription would be happy to start paying a nominal/reasonable sum to keep the service alive.

- As there is an active community of 'home brew' enthusiasts around the S1, did you consder perhaps releasing sections of the service to open source to allow the community to at least make it easier for the homebrew community to provide their own EPG service? What a great PR opportunity that would be!

As it stands this is a bit of a PR disaster for you, you were MUCH more likley to get more custom out of existing S1 owners if you didn't effectivley kill the box they already have, as now most people simply do not trust TiVO anymore and will be very unlikley to now spend out on the Virgin Media equipment.

So, I think I have put my points and questions reasonably and fairly. WIll you at least have the good manners to inform your very loyal S1 community the real reasons behind this?

Yours, a (still just about) loyal TiVO fan

Welcome to the blog

Hi there.  This blog is to keep everyone up to date on any news relating to the shutdown of the EPG for series 1 uk TiVo's.  I'll post any news relating to the campaign to persuade them to change their mind along with any pertinent news on the progress of the homebrew community run alternatives which are in the pipeline.

To start with here are the relevant links to the campaign:

Petition online to save the EPG service: tinyurl.com/saves1tivo
Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/SaveSeries1UKTiVo
Twitter Feed: http://www.twitter.com/saves1uktivo

There are also some disussions on the forums which may be of interest:

TiVo Community - UK Series 1 Forum here

Please share and spread the word, if we are to have any hope of changing their mind, we need the numbers to show the interest!