TiVo Sticks Ads Into Timeshifting

Today, TiVo has begun implementation of a new feature allowing advertisers to insert text ads into paused programming. That’s right, skipping those commercials is finally becoming impossible.

These ads can work on live TV or prerecorded content, with Fox and Mercedes-Benz lined up among the system’s first customers.

Luckily, the feature seems to be quarantined to pausing only for the time being, while unrolling only to Series 2 customers first, sparing those of use with Series 3 and TiVo HD boxes from the ads…for now. Evidently, asking customers to pay a reasonable subscription cost for small bits of publicly available data to be downloaded to proprietary hardware sold above cost is just not as profitable as it used to be.

TiVo, look at how Microsoft has fooled us. They’ve stuck ads all over the Xbox 360 in spite of subscription costs. But they haven’t utilized those ads in a way that would distract from the system’s core function: gameplay. We haven’t seen these new pausing ads yet (anyone with a Series 2 at home, feel free to grab us a shot), but our initial inclination is that they distract from core function and are thereby even eviler than your standard ad whoring. [electronista]

From reader K.C.