The past few weeks have had a lot of news that are about “the future of TV”. Everyone is apparently moving into this space at a rapid pace. The past few weeks major players such as Microsoft, Google, Apple and TiVo have made new product announcements. I think most people reading this knows about the Google and Apple TV news, those are huge topics on their own. Microsoft’s didn’t get much press to the mainstream that they will now have Media Center ‘Headless Appliances’. Maybe you may not have heard about TiVo’s somewhat similar plan. A theme has certainly been solutions without any local disk. The problem I have with TiVo’s approach to this is that they will create market confusion and in many ways it’s their own fault.

TiVo has a branding issue, A HUGE ONE!: Because they were pretty much the pioneer and leader in the space, the word “TiVo” means “DVR” to the mass audience. I mean really, DVR is literally synonymous with TiVo. Having an TiVo-branded, Insignia TV using the “latest TiVo non-DVR software” is just going to cause a huge mess for Best Buy. I’m not going to know Best Buy but their majority consumers and staff are normally not the best educated on their products.

A Quickly Crowded Space: Can TiVo really come out on top of the names of Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Apple (not mention Boxee, Roku, PopcornHour, etc) in an all out war of merging TV and the Cloud? And TiVo’s 3rd Party Cloud Apps are rather sparse and a bit dated compared to what Google could bring from Android. I know TiVo is facing some financial issues with 5 straight quarterly losses but I’m not convinced that this is the best strategy to improve that situation. In fact, I think its a distraction that will prevent them to focus where they need to.

Cable/Satellite Industry Boxes: Steve Jobs said the other day, “nobody’s willing to buy a set-top box” because cable operators “give everybody a set-top box for free, or for $10 a month”. But this is exactly why putting the UI into the TV is going to fail too. Unless the Cable/Satellite industry gives up control of that core box (ROFL) and replace it with a CableCard/Tru2Way alternative, putting a UI inside the TV’s core features will struggle just as much as another set top box. Why?

Remote Controls: There’s not much detail on what this TV’s configuration will look like but it’s either going to require a CableCard or IR Blasters. I’m assuming it will come with a TiVo QWERTY remote but will it be Universal? If they have a BluRay or DVD Player, A/V Receiver, etc then they will more likely use the Universal Remote which means a built-in TV UI will most likely now be used, at least not it’s full potential.

Local storage Is Nice: Sure I think Cloud TV or IPTV is the future but I like to queue and store shows, not just for the sake of storing but also to eliminate bandwidth constraints and lags. Most of the videos I watch online on a TV, I store locally first to have a seamless watching, pausing and rewinding experience. This can be done on a TiVo today for selected Podcasts, I’m not sure about this Insignia solution yet.

Revenue Concerns: I sure hope TiVo doesn’t try to generate monthly fees and/or a “TiVo Basic” Tier. Those days are behind us and this economy is not going to help TiVo generate revenue in that way. I still own and use two TiVo Series 2s with Lifetime Subscriptions on them because I can’t justify the upgrades when I also have a Windows Media Center/Boxee/Hulu machine to handle HD and much more.

All-In-One TV Lock-ins: Lastly, I (and many others) don’t like all the things being built into TV’s. People don’t want to by a new TV every 3 years, it’s a longer term investment. The industry is trying to push things like Widgets and 3D Technology to spark consumer spending to replace a 1080p TV they fairly recently bought. I would rather have all that stuff in a seperate box. That way if something goes wrong it is easier & cheaper to repair/replace. Keep the TV a TV and let us decide what options we want with a seperate box.

There’s no doubt the Internet-connected TV is an idea that’s finally ripe for consumer adoption, I’m just afraid that TiVo’s newest strategy is 3-Thumbs Down though with the other options out there.