TiVo Mini and Apple TV

I am dedicated to TiVo - I've had multiple boxes for nearly 15 years.  I like the ease of use, the reliability, etc.  It's a great product and service (but very expensive).

I love the TiVo app for iOS.  It works great, it has a lot of flexibility, and has a pretty good interface (pretty good as it tries to do a lot, including acting as a soft remote control for multiple TiVo boxes).

TiVo makes a TiVo Mini. This is sort of a weird product - it is like a headunit for a TiVo that allows one to replicate the functions of a TiVo on a different monitor.  But, at its heart, is really just the TiVo app in hardware form.  And it is very expensive ($149).  And, even weirder, it is inconvenient to set up - it requires a hard wire (coax or ethernet) connection.  No wireless permitted.

My wish: that TiVo would release its app for Apple TV.  I know this would cut into TiVo Mini sales but I wonder how many people are really buying a Mini. I also wonder how many people would find TiVo more attractive if they could own one and watch in multiple locations with an AppleTV.  AppleTV seems to work fine on WiFi (unlike the TiVo Mini).  And the programming effort for TiVo is likely trivial (I believe tvOS is closely related to iOS).  I know that the TiVo remote won't work but, given that the main benefit of the TiVo Mini is just to stream from the "main" TiVo box, I think it would make sense for TiVo to offer this.  It would bring more people into the TiVo fold and that's probably a good thing.

Targeted broadcast television advertising

Given the high value of digital advertising, much of which is based upon the better targeting, why haven't cable providers and broadcasters joined forces to deliver targeted ads?  I think this should be relatively straightforward (massive because of the numbers but straightforward nevertheless): with broadcasters' permission, cable providers would replace the ads with those better targeted to the specific household.  Delivery should be relatively simple.  Ads could be pre-loaded during low demand periods to avoid the need to stream ads in realtime (DVR equipped cable boxes may be able to do this without hardware modifications).

I believe advertisers would object if they perceive their ratecards as losing value (we paid for x households, instead we got y).  So we would have a combination of broadcast program and narrowcast ads. Which, in fact, is how adserving works generally anyway.  And could very well be why Google is getting in the broadband business.

fan with a thermostat

I've been looking but can't find a simple small fan with a thermostat to cool down my media cabinet.  This should be a $20 product but it doesn't seem to exist.  I've found over-priced components to cobble one together but that would be nearly $100.  My cable box keeps shutting off because it overheats.

TiVo this

Why don’t broadcasters include a link on their program websites to “TiVo this”? I understand that they would prefer not to have viewers skip through commercials. But, at the same time, I think they would prefer that: (i) it be their shows that are skipped and (ii) make the televisions automatically tune into the show on the chance that the viewer is watching live. And, perhaps, they could embed in the privacy policy something that allows them to get more finegrained insights into the viewer’s habits (but still not disclosing identity, etc.).