Government trying to shut down Tivo

It really is like they beg people to be pirates.

DVR services increase the amount of television people watch. If you force people back into the old model they will (1) pirate and/or (2) watch less television.

Even though I can fast-forward through commercials I still see them; sure it's 30 seconds reduced to 3 seconds, but I still see it. I get your big stupid logo in my brain, and if it looks interesting (like the amp'd mobile commercials) I might even check it out for entertainment value.

I've got Netflix for old seasons and the Internet for ongoing stuff.

Have fun knifing your baby, MPAA.

The whole point of the system (government) lately is to make it impossible for anyone to be a law abiding citizen. That way gov. can always dig up some dirt on you if it needs to!

Boy, am I glad I own a non-TiVo DVR.

I gave up on watching television long ago. Most of the time it is just not worth it. I watch the news, sometimes, and that is about it. My wife and kids however are glued to it.

Think I need to go by a copy of Orwell's 1984. Seems he may have just been about 20 years early in the date.

Why bother with fiction.
Just read up on the history of Soviet Union from 1970 to 1990 and you'll see plenty of similarities... just under different names.

If only there were a legal way to download the shows I want to watch....

Legality is overrated.

I own a Philips (piece-of-crap) DVD recorder with built-in hard drive and TV Guide On Screen. Full DVR functionality with only the analog cable line coming in. I wasn't joking. The Philips unit can be a pain in the ass sometimes, but I don't have to worry about the government's shenanigans.

No one is (yet) planning to march into your home and confiscate old, less restrictive technology. Old TiVos will continue to work too, just like your DVD recorder will. But the day will come when this old stuff breaks and it'll be too expensive to fix, it won't be possible to fix it, or there will simply be little or no new content which can be recorded using this kind of old tech.

The game being played here is an eventual phase out of all fair-use friendly technology. In the Brave New World envisioned not only by the RIAA and the MPAA, but by Microsoft and even good ol' Apple, old-style technology will be replaced by a DRM (Digital Rights Management) friendly electronic ecosystem. In this ecosystem every output will be ciphered and every input will require that ciphering, with all content -- music, video, games, computer software -- traveling on a very short leash controlled by content producers.

Don't expect to see component video or line-level audio jacks any more. Some analog holes will still exist -- such as speaker wires and headphone jacks -- but simple all-analog or A-to-D technology which might be used to record these signals will be flat-out illegal to manufacture for general consumer use. It will even become illegal to build this kind of equipment yourself as such actions would constitute "illegal circumvention".

If this and subsequent legislation follows the pattern established by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), not only will building such equipment be become illegal, but simply telling someone else how to build these things or where to find them will constitute a punishable offense, most likely carrying a minimum five-year sentence for conviction.

First of all, we can still hope that this ridiculous bill won't pass. As bad as some of the laws are which have managed passage through Congress are (like parts of the DMCA), the MPAA and RIAA have also overreached before and failed. Then again, if this "analog hole" bill doesn't pass on its own merit the first time around, one never knows when it might reappear as a deeply-buried provision in a totally unrelated bill, such as, oh, I don't know... a major defense spending bill.

At any rate, think of all of the cheap electronics which are sold bundled with cheap ear buds or cheap headphones. These are simple unpowered devices, using nothing more than the analog signal they are fed at low power to function. Headphones which worked only with ciphered digital signals would be a much more expensive and complicated affair, requiring additional power from batteries or a new power-providing interface.

As much as the consumer electronics industry has gone along with (sometimes grumbling) **AA crap in the past, I think that essentially banning the manufacture and sale of simple headphones and unpowered speakers would be pushing the consumer electronics too far. They'd balk, and balk hard.

Yes, our rights will continue to be trampled on, laws will be controlled by the rich corporations, and you soon will be watched 24/7. Once it gets to the point where the large majority of the populace realizes the current system is horrible I can't imagine what will happen. I mean, it's not like it's ever happened before in history, you know, so we have no idea what could happen. Your guess is as good as mine

This is all going to backfire on the MPAA and RIAA. Their profits will do no better than remain constant because consumers will just find other ways to entertain themselves (like blogs, podcasts, vodcasts, small free videos/films, satellite radio, and maybe even terrestrial radio). It's already begun and it will continue to get worse the more the industries bite the hands that feed them.

What blows my mind is that they're trying to pass laws that far overstep the spirit of copyright and will end up making criminals of every person who watches movies and TV or listens to music. People will get tired of being restricted from using content that they bought and/or spent thousands on an HD television to see.

I need to start developing really cool games and gadgets that require no electricity. That's what our society will cling to in the future. You bought it. You own it. You do whatever the hell you want with it.

Too bad audio didn't make it into the constitution!

You guys are talking about more restrictions than we put on guns!

Need a catchy slogan like "pry the cable out of my cold, stiff hands."