Yahoo! Go TV… Powered by TiVo?

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Maybe I got it right back in January… In Friday’s 10-K filing, Yahoo listed TiVo as a partner for their Go software initiative which includes PVR functionality. Thomas Hawk had some hand’s on time with an early version of the software at CES and came away impressed.

Hmmm… Yahoo apps on TiVo, TiVo apps on Yahoo… they’re getting quite cozy don’t you think? Is it too early to resume acquisition speculation? ;)

Yahoo’s 10-K says: Yahoo! Go TV will bring the Internet to the PC-connected television screen. Yahoo! Go Mobile allows consumers to take the Internet services they use on their PC onto their mobile device in one simple, fully synchronized application. Yahoo! is working with companies including AT&T, Microsoft, Intel Corporation, Nokia and TiVo to bring these services to market. Yahoo! Go services are expected to be launched and accessible to our users in 2006 and are intended to provide a seamless connected experience for our users.

Yahoo press release says:

  • Full Personal Video Recorder (PVR) functionality, including trick play features and access to the PC for storage of content
  • Full TV tuning capabilities to control your TV channels

7 thoughts on “Yahoo! Go TV… Powered by TiVo?”

  1. It is possible TiVo’s cooperation is limited to Yahoo’s cobranded TV listings. Perhaps Yahoo Go will offer TiVo scheduling via mobile phone and Yahoo is rolling their own PVR software. Or perhaps Yahoo Go TV will natively playback .tivo files. Hmmm… Hopefully we’ll learn more when TiVo reports March 8th.

  2. At the Yahoo! tent at CES they had two versions of their living room software. One was a TiVo version and one was a non TiVo version. The non TiVo version was GoTV which was available as a download app and would work on any computer. The non-TiVo version did not have a PVR. The TiVo version was what looked like a prototype of a similar service for folks with Series 2 TiVos.

    Although they have been working together on these initiatives I don’t think there is anything going on beyond business as usual.

    TiVo would be a good play for Yahoo! though. But heck, TiVo would be good play for a lot of people.

  3. tivo functionality is not likely to come by way of yahoo’s widgets. these offer a trival development framework centered around javascript and some imaging libraries.

    tivo on windows requires real-time os guarentees that windows doesn’t have out of the box. not that it can’t be done:
    http://tinyurl.com/ggqv9

    i believe it was ramsey who said they were looking at the pc as a platform a few years ago. this would likely take quite an effort (team of maybe 6-10 for 6-8 months) and would require win32 experts, current code base experts, testers, a project manager, and a yahoo liaison. so, i don’t think this is the path of least resistance.

    most likely, tivo would just rebrand a cut of the sa2 for yahoo.

    relevent to this discussion, is yahoo’s recent press:
    http://tinyurl.com/zvysk

    the message i take away from this last article is that yahoo would like past statements about video pursuits to be taken with a grain of salt. the article also alludes to a power struggle within yahoo over strategic direction. yahoo could be losing their tivo ally. hopefully there are some sharp analysts that will drill yahoo about past statements in relation to current strategy to clarify yahoo’s future committments.

  5. Tivo would be a good acquisition for Google.

    Right now, TiVo’s market value is just over $500 million, or about a third of what Google paid for YouTube. Google could plunk down $1 billion for TiVo and still get a bargain. Then Google could begin selling TiVo boxes for $100 each and offering the top-notch TiVo subscription service for free; with such a strategy it could quickly grab market share from copycat rivals.

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