By Patrick Avenell
The CEO of TiVo’s Australian distributor yesterday rejected claims the launch had been a failure. This came at a press conference used to promote a new range of content initiatives for the ‘media device’.
Hybrid TV has been battling manfully over the last month to improve the public and media perception of the TiVo offering. Yesterday’s announcements do enhance TiVo’s functionality, with the device continually offering more and more content. Doubts persist, however, with various outlets reporting that only 14,000 units have been sold.
When asked if this new media drive was a response to an internal assessment of failure, Minicola was stern.
“It’s scaremongering to say we failed and now we’re repackaging. We’re not evolutionary, we’re revolutionary,” she said.
Minicola’s claims of revolution are countered, however, by her own persistence in using buzz words. Aside from wanting TiVo to be called a “media device”, rather than a PVR, continued reference was made yesterday to abstractions such as ‘the central screen’, ‘convergent media’ and ‘family psychology’.
Regardless of terminology, however, yesterday marked a significant milestone for TiVo. The device is finally isolating itself from the PVR pack, and can now more properly grow into its self-described media device tag.