Channel 7 has announced a partnership with TiVo to introduce the service in Australia. Age story. TiVo press release.
For those who can’t wait, and are willing to do some hacking, there’s always OzTivo, of course. Other countries blessed with TiVo include the UK, US, Canada and Taiwan, with Mexico getting it soon.
What’s the point of an electronic program guide when the TV stations won’t keep to it?
We can only hope that at least channel 7 will start behaving in that respect, given they’re involved with TiVo.
I heard that Ch7 wanted it in time for the Olympics, but TiVo couldn’t deliver on time (only nine months late!): TiVo haven’t done digital TV before. If they’re recording HD TV, they’re going to have a lot of data to store, so they’re going to need a monster hard drive. And I suspect they’re going to record the entire broadcast stream, rather than just the program within it (so ABC and ABC2 simultaneously, as well as the ABC EPG and that Jazz radio program). Sharing programs, in Australia’s broadband environment and with HD content, is just not going to happen either. Still, the TiVo brand name is worth a lot.