# "NEW" tag vs. first aired date



## kentsu (Jun 28, 2014)

My family and I love our Roamio. It's our first TiVO device. Years ago we had an UltimateTV but had been suffering for years with the cable box provided by our service (Frontier).

One thing I'm confused about is when / why the "NEW" tag appears next to a show. For many shows we record, episodes are regularly marked new that clearly are not. The most confusing thing is that the first aired date, which the Roamio consistently displays in the episode details, seems to contain the info needed to verify whether a show marked new is really new or not, but the Roamio unfortunately seems to ignore this information.

I'd love to know more about this and whether there are any rumored plans for the Roamio to start using this info when determining whether and episode is new.

Thanks.


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## dianebrat (Jul 6, 2002)

The New tag is not a consistent marker, while it can be helpful at times, you can't and shouldn't depend on it.

I know that doesn't answer your bigger questions, but that's the way it's been and most likely will continue to be. It looks like you haven't had the joy of "new to us" recordings with airdates in the past in other countries, that's a fun one to learn about too.


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## BigJimOutlaw (Mar 21, 2004)

Shows tend to be labeled "New" for the first 28 days, it's not entirely synonymous with "first airing". There might be some other cases where it happens, but that's the biggest one.

As a result, when a Tivo is first purchased, it might also record shows you've already seen (if it wasn't recorded previously) because of this "new-ish" tag, but after a while the recordings start to work normally.


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## FitzAusTex (May 7, 2014)

One other thing that is frustrating is that we get the first aired date for British shows based on the British first aired date, not the US first aired date. It is likely complicated, but wish it could be changed so I (we) could set up season passes for "new" for these shows, which we can't since even though they are new to the US, they are never marked as new, since their first aired date was generally months ago (when they first aired in the UK). 

And by the way, it is INSANE, that we can't count on the "new" indicator. The "new" indicator is one of the most important features of a DVR. I'm not saying that most shows are tagged incorrectly, but this indicator should be rock solid. The logic for "new" mostly seems to make sense, but sometimes not. Seems simple for tivo to only mark a show "new" if, and only if, the first aired date = the day the show is airing.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

BigJimOutlaw said:


> Shows tend to be labeled "New" for the first 28 days, it's not entirely synonymous with "first airing". There might be some other cases where it happens, but that's the biggest one.
> 
> As a result, when a Tivo is first purchased, it might also record shows you've already seen (if it wasn't recorded previously) because of this "new-ish" tag, but after a while the recordings start to work normally.


While they are treated as "new" by a "New only" (a.k.a. FRO) season pass, they are not usually flagged as "NEW" in the guide unless the OAD is the same day as the guide entry. I have yet to figure out what criteria it uses to mark *recordings* as "NEW".



kentsu said:


> My family and I love our Roamio. It's our first TiVO device. Years ago we had an UltimateTV but had been suffering for years with the cable box provided by our service (Frontier).
> 
> One thing I'm confused about is when / why the "NEW" tag appears next to a show. For many shows we record, episodes are regularly marked new that clearly are not. The most confusing thing is that the first aired date, which the Roamio consistently displays in the episode details, seems to contain the info needed to verify whether a show marked new is really new or not, but the Roamio unfortunately seems to ignore this information.
> 
> ...


Do you have a specific example of what you are talking about?


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

lpwcomp said:


> While they are treated as "new" by a "New only" (a.k.a. FRO) season pass, they are not usually flagged as "NEW" in the guide unless the OAD is the same day as the guide entry. I have yet to figure out what criteria it uses to mark *recordings* as "NEW".
> 
> Do you have a specific example of what you are talking about?


I will give one show that has this problem *Downton Abbey* as it is first showed in the UK.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

lessd said:


> I will give one show that has this problem *Downton Abbey* as it is first showed in the UK.


I was asking for an example of a show that is "flagged" as new even though it isn't. If you're saying that *Downton Abbey* is being shown in the U.S. within 28 days of it's initial UK showing and is therefore being scheduled by an FRO SP, that would be a _*good*_ thing.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

lpwcomp said:


> I was asking for an example of a show that is "flagged" as new even though it isn't. If you're saying that *Downton Abbey* is being shown in the U.S. within 28 days of it's initial UK showing and is therefore being scheduled by an FRO SP, that would be a _*good*_ thing.


I have Downton Abbey as a SP new only and the recordings are (or have been) correct. The next US installment will be in January 2015 I think.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

lessd said:


> I have Downton Abbey as a SP new only and the recordings are correct.


And isn't that a good thing rather than a problem? BTW, I have the same situation with "Continuum" and IIRC "Lost Girl", except of course that they originally air in Canada.

Isn't this much better than shows like "Motive" and "Rookie Blue" and how "Doctor Who" _*used*_ to be?


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

lpwcomp said:


> And isn't that a good thing rather than a problem? BTW, I have the same situation with "Continuum" and IIRC "Lost Girl", except of course that they originally air in Canada.
> 
> Isn't this much better than shows like "Motive" and "Rookie Blue" and how "Doctor Who" _*used*_ to be?


I is a good thing, I did not think I implied anything other than good.


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## cherry ghost (Sep 13, 2005)

lessd said:


> I have Downton Abbey as a SP new only and the recordings are (or have been) correct. The next US installment will be in January 2015 I think.


You can set a Downton Abbey" SP? Around here it's "Masterpiece Theatre" on PBS.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

cherry ghost said:


> You can set a Downton Abbey" SP? Around here it's "Masterpiece Theatre" on PBS.


I set it up when Downton Abbey was going on in the next week some years ago, the SP does say Masterpiece Theatre and a few times I have gotten some other program, but in the last 3 years I gotten about 4 Masterpiece Theatre programs that were not Downton Abbey, I can live with that.


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## tomhorsley (Jul 22, 2010)

What I always have trouble understanding is why they can't use some microscopic fraction of the terabytes available on the hard disk to keep a permanent record of the episode titles it has previously recorded. Why limit things to 28 days or rely on obviously unreliable info from the folks providing the TV schedule info.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

lessd said:


> I set it up when Downton Abbey was going on in the next week some years ago, the SP does say Masterpiece Theatre and a few times I have gotten some other program, but in the last 3 years I gotten about 4 Masterpiece Theatre programs that were not Downton Abbey, I can live with that.


Then it is not actually an example of the "problem". As far as TMS & the TiVo are concerned, they are episodes of "Masterpiece Theatre", not "Downton Abbey". Different seriesId and more to the point, different OAD.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

tomhorsley said:


> What I always have trouble understanding is why they can't use some microscopic fraction of the terabytes available on the hard disk to keep a permanent record of the episode titles it has previously recorded. Why limit things to 28 days or rely on obviously unreliable info from the folks providing the TV schedule info.


After all, every TiVo ever made has "terabytes available on the hard disk"


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## Worf (Sep 15, 2000)

FitzAusTex said:


> One other thing that is frustrating is that we get the first aired date for British shows based on the British first aired date, not the US first aired date. It is likely complicated, but wish it could be changed so I (we) could set up season passes for "new" for these shows, which we can't since even though they are new to the US, they are never marked as new, since their first aired date was generally months ago (when they first aired in the UK).
> 
> And by the way, it is INSANE, that we can't count on the "new" indicator. The "new" indicator is one of the most important features of a DVR. I'm not saying that most shows are tagged incorrectly, but this indicator should be rock solid. The logic for "new" mostly seems to make sense, but sometimes not. Seems simple for tivo to only mark a show "new" if, and only if, the first aired date = the day the show is airing.


I believe the "NEW" flag is set by the station when they send their listings to Tribune. As someone from Canada, the Canadian versions of stations leave the OAD at the US air date, but the shows always show up as new because the stations know they've never aired it, so they set the NEW flag, and TiVo picks it up properly as a new episode.

Of course, US stations are more used to being the first to air, so they generally set the New flag as appropriate. But stations that take programming from outside the US (e.g., Canadian TV shows, or UK shows) aren't used to setting the new flag because well, the US is the one that generates content and new programming generally is in the US first.

Everyone outside gets the programming, the OAD stays the same (as it should, it's "original air date" and not "aired in this country date"), but they know they purchased new episodes and they know they're running new episodes, so they set their new episode flag as appropriate, even if it's been months since the US airing. (Canadian versions of History and Discovery do it, even though the OADs were months to a year prior).

Of course, it's annoying for applications that don't use the new flag - like Windows Media Center (probably because it uses the new flag from the US program information, and not the Canadian inofrmation), resulting in the "new episodes only" never recording stuff. Of course, I use TiVo for that since it uses the proper country's new flag.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

Worf said:


> I believe the "NEW" flag is set by the station when they send their listings to Tribune. As someone from Canada, the Canadian versions of stations leave the OAD at the US air date, but the shows always show up as new because the stations know they've never aired it, so they set the NEW flag, and TiVo picks it up properly as a new episode.
> 
> Of course, US stations are more used to being the first to air, so they generally set the New flag as appropriate. But stations that take programming from outside the US (e.g., Canadian TV shows, or UK shows) aren't used to setting the new flag because well, the US is the one that generates content and new programming generally is in the US first.
> 
> ...


This is all complete nonsense. TiVo does not and never has used a "NEW" flag for scheduling purposes or anything else for that matter.


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## abovethesink (Aug 26, 2013)

I get random old boxing cards on SNY as part of a wishlist that is only to record new shows all the time. They have old first aired dates. I know I've seen the behavior in the past too, but I don't know with what. Always has been a minor thing.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

abovethesink said:


> I get random old boxing cards on SNY as part of a wishlist that is only to record new shows all the time. They have old first aired dates. I know I've seen the behavior in the past too, but I don't know with what. Always has been a minor thing.


If the information for the program is "generic" (usually has an OAD of the first episode of the series and I suspect is missing the proramId), the TiVo treats it as if it _*might*_ be new so an FRO SP will record it just in case. The thinking here is that it is better to record a rerun than to miss a new ep.


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## nooneuknow (Feb 5, 2011)

lpwcomp said:


> If the information for the program is "generic" (usually has an OAD of the first episode of the series and I suspect is missing the proramId), the TiVo treats it as if it _*might*_ be new so an FRO SP will record it just in case. The thinking here is that it is better to record a rerun than to miss a new ep.


Yes, this is my understanding and experience, as well.

There's also the 28-day window, where (under certain circumstances) sometimes SPs will record repeats as new, which is also a "just in case"/"better safe than sorry" call by TiVo, AFAIK/IMO.

I'd rather take the split-second it takes to delete a repeat, than miss something new that didn't record, and may never air again and/or never becomes available on Hulu Plus or Netflix. I get very angry when this happens, and my only choice is to PAY to rent/buy it.

Unfortunately, many networks have learned how to "game" our DVRs, by intentionally giving every repeat generic data, insuring it will record, sometimes even when it is already in the My Shows/NPL. If there's anything about the way TiVo determines what to record to get upset about, it's this, which isn't even TiVo's fault. Get angry at Discovery and the others intentionally gaming or DVRs.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

nooneuknow said:


> There's also the 28-day window, where (under certain circumstances) sometimes SPs will record repeats as new, which is also a "just in case"/"better safe than sorry" call by TiVo, AFAIK/IMO.


That _*should*_ only come into play when setting up a new SP. It's also what allows an FRO SP to work on _*some*_ imports as long as they air in the U.S. within 28 days of their OAD.


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## nooneuknow (Feb 5, 2011)

lpwcomp said:


> That _*should*_ only come into play when setting up a new SP. It's also what allows an FRO SP to work on _*some*_ imports as long as they air in the U.S. within 28 days of their OAD.


I had "new SPs" in my original post, then removed it, because I wasn't 100% sure, and went with "under certain circumstances" and "sometimes".

Thanks for the clarification (about as clear as it can get, since some things are still hit and miss).

I've seen an influx of people who just set up their new TiVo and want to know why they are getting repeats. I really wish TCF would add a "search within TCF using Google" option. Even I can't find what I'm looking for here, without using Google to search within TCF, the manual way... A prime example of topic duplication on TCF is anything to do with MoCA/PoE filters. I get mad that people ask a question that has been answered 30+ times (sometimes by me), only to find I can't find those answers quickly and easily within the forum...


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## Jonathan_S (Oct 23, 2001)

kentsu said:


> My family and I love our Roamio. It's our first TiVO device. Years ago we had an UltimateTV but had been suffering for years with the cable box provided by our service (Frontier).
> 
> One thing I'm confused about is when / why the "NEW" tag appears next to a show. For many shows we record, episodes are regularly marked new that clearly are not. The most confusing thing is that the first aired date, which the Roamio consistently displays in the episode details, seems to contain the info needed to verify whether a show marked new is really new or not, but the Roamio unfortunately seems to ignore this information.


Just to clarify, when you're talking about the "NEW" tag do you mean the guide data / upcoming episode data includes a "new" tag, or do you mean the "new" tag that TiVo (sometimes) puts next to recorded shows in the now playing list?

It looks like everyone has been talking about the former (which isn't under TiVo's control; that, like all the guide data, is provided directly from Tribune). But based on your wording I thought you might be talking about the later.

(Though I'm not sure what logic TiVo uses to flag recordings as "new" is Now Playing; so I still can't really answer your question)


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

Jonathan_S said:


> Just to clarify, when you're talking about the "NEW" tag do you mean the guide data / upcoming episode data includes a "new" tag, or do you mean the "new" tag that TiVo (sometimes) puts next to recorded shows in the now playing list?
> 
> It looks like everyone has been talking about the former (which isn't under TiVo's control; that, like all the guide data, is provided directly from Tribune).


No, it isn't. It's *based* on data (the OAD) received from TMS. The "NEW" tag in the guide and upcoming episode list is generated by the TiVo when the OAD is the same as the showing date. If the rerun of an episode occurs before Midnight of the day of the initial showing, it will be flagged in the guide as "NEW".


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## Jonathan_S (Oct 23, 2001)

lpwcomp said:


> No, it isn't. It's *based* on data (the OAD) received from TMS. The "NEW" tag in the guide and upcoming episode list is generated by the TiVo when the OAD is the same as the showing date. If the rerun of an episode occurs before Midnight of the day of the initial showing, it will be flagged in the guide as "NEW".


Oops. I was mentally getting it mixed up with the "R" (for repeat airing) text that Tribune includes in their guide data.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

Jonathan_S said:


> Oops. I was mentally getting it mixed up with the "R" (for repeat airing) text that Tribune includes in their guide data.


Yeah, the "R" flag is for informational purposes only. The TiVo scheduler ignores it, which is a _*good*_ thing.


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