# System Message 20/4/11 - Virgin Media TV, powered by TiVo, is here.



## spitfires (Dec 19, 2006)

Slightly re-worded version of the last one



> Subject: Virgin Media TV, powered by TiVo, is here.
> From: The TiVo Team
> Date: Wed 20th Apr 2011
> Expire: Wed 4th May 2011
> ...


Note the "If you live in a cable area"


----------



## Automan (Oct 29, 2000)

Perhaps they should say "a Virgin cable area"?

Automan.


----------



## digital_S (May 15, 2002)

I deleted mine straight away!!!


----------



## spitfires (Dec 19, 2006)

@Automan 
Obviouly they think that Virgin are the only cable supplier in the UK!


----------



## Trinitron (Jan 20, 2003)

At least they seem to have got the message that not everyone can get cable. 

(I can, but not Virgin!)


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Trinitron said:


> At least they seem to have got the message that not everyone can get cable.


Surely if that was true they wouldn't be planning to leave the 50% of us who can't get a Virgin Media Tivo without Tivo service after 1st June.:down::down::down:


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

They know perfectly well Pete.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

TCM2007 said:


> They know perfectly well Pete.


Then why don't they continue to let us have Tivo service.

Time to get round to starting a few threads over on the US tivocommunity forums I reckon.


----------



## Automan (Oct 29, 2000)

I guess when Virgin got an exclusive deal for the UK that signed the death warrant for our Series 1 units.

Automan.


----------



## alek (May 22, 2008)

Why do other people get these messages a day or sometimes two before me.

Not that it matters.


Alek


----------



## katman (Jun 4, 2002)

alek said:


> Why do other people get these messages a day or sometimes two before me.
> Alek


Maybe your service isnt goint to stop until the 3rd June LOL.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

alek said:


> Why do other people get these messages a day or sometimes two before me.


These system messages don't illuminate the new yellow message waiting icon in the Tivo on screen program banner and they also have a shorter life than ordinary Tivo messages about channel lineup changes plus the Tivo cannot hold more than two of these System Messages at any one time. It can hold a lot more channel lineup change messages than this.

The people who post here are the first to see these messages rather than being typical of when the average Tivo user will see them.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Automan said:


> I guess when Virgin got an exclusive deal for the UK that signed the death warrant for our Series 1 units.


What about last minute stays of execution after moving and eloquent speeches on behalf of the condemned party.

I thought they were very keen on this kind of thing across the pond so perhaps there is still hope if we kick up enough fuss.

My advice would be for UK Series 1 owners to start posting on the US Tivocommunity forums and the VirginMedia Tivo forum on the issue as nobody is going to take any interest in the matter in the UK tivocommunity forum sections.


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Too late Pete, give it up and move on.


----------



## alek (May 22, 2008)

Why worry, we are going to be better of without them


Alek


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

alek said:


> Why worry, we are going to be better of without them


To be frank I think that is an optimist's view. I'm sure some kind of service will be got going after June 1st but I highly doubt that either Suggestions or Wishlists will work anywhere near as well as they did before as I suspect Metadata from the new source will be significantly less comprehensive. I would also expect significantly more in the way of complete server outages for significant periods, at least in the early days.

What Dave, Stuart and the rest of them are trying to do is make sure we still have a working service of some kind. The natural tub thumpers in our midst inevitably tout that it will be better but I suspect that in due course many here will come to realise that Tribune actually did a pretty reasonable job and that most of the frustrations in the product came from inherent hardware design flaws such as being unable to revise start and end times or even swap channels at the last moment due to our Tivos not being able to directly decode the over the air Freeview Freesat or Cable EPG

I am hopeful that something will still be in place after June 1st but those of us who wear rather less rose tinted spectacles in viewing life would undoubtedly expect things to get significantly worse after June 1st before they possibly eventually get better.


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

God you can be an arse sometimes Pete.

People are going to great lengths to make sure the metadata etc is at least as good as Tribunes, and as it will correctable by "crowdsourcing" there's every reason to think it will be better. As for dissing server reliability before it's even started, that's "glass three quarters empty" if ever I heard it.

And all you can contribute is negativity and whining.


----------



## alek (May 22, 2008)

Pete77 said:


> The natural tub thumpers in our midst


I thought I had been called every name under the Sun.

I don't wear rose coloured glasses. But I do see challenges as opportunities rather than drawbacks or disasters.

An enthusiast working on a problem for the kudos or the kick of solving it or because he believes in it, will often outperform a team of highly paid twats working on it with one eye on the clock, while planning their vacations.

Alek


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

TCM2007 said:


> People are going to great lengths to make sure the metadata etc is at least as good as Tribunes, and as it will correctable by "crowdsourcing" there's every reason to think it will be better. As for dissing server reliability before it's even started, that's "glass three quarters empty" if ever I heard it.


Well I have zipped over to the Tivoland forums and looked around what's posted there and see precious little in the way of any embryonic service I could help to offer test. Nearly three months have gone by since the announcement of The End and there is only a month left to go now.

Given that after June 1st the Tivo servers fall silent I would have expected an element of parallel running for a number of weeks beforehand to try and iron out the bugs. I and quite a few other people here have retired Tivos that could easily be deployed to that purpose.

I have personal experience of working for a company for several years that had to deliver data feeds of over 10,000 funds once a day and I can tell you data collection and distribution is a real old grind that takes a lot of work. It isn't like some one off project that start on, slowly build up to and complete. Its an ongoing commitment once it starts that never stops (a bit like running a restaurant or a pub) and can easily grind people down in terms of their enthusiasm over time.

I'm not saying you won't have a service as good or better than the Tribune but I am saying that it could easily take you 6 months after the Tribune EPG is discontinued to begin to achieve such a goal.

At the moment I'm only seeing some of the same kind of naive optimism that is embraced over at www.save-concorde.org.uk/forums/index.php


----------



## LarryDavid (Jan 4, 2007)

To be honest anything that updates the EPG so we can schedule progs to record and 'series link' is fine. We turned off the suggestions after a few weeks as, frankly, it never turned up anything we didn't already know about (and kept recording 6+ hours of 'off air' for whatever reason) and we never used the wishlists anyway.

The No 1 reason for our TiVo was series link. And as long as that still works more or less as good as it does now .... well great :up: :up: :up:


----------



## Automan (Oct 29, 2000)

Indeed, just accurate series link data and first run / not repeats would do.

Starring actor name and by program title would also be nice.

Automan.


----------



## spitfires (Dec 19, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> .
> Given that after June 1st the Tivo servers fall silent I would have expected an element of parallel running for a number of weeks beforehand to try and iron out the bugs.


What makes you think that isn't happening ?

(Hint: just because one hasn't been invited doesn't mean the party isn't taking place)


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

spitfires said:


> (Hint: just because one hasn't been invited doesn't mean the party isn't taking place)


Surely if you are going to all the trouble of running the party anyway you might as well invite as many guests as possible to get the maximum possible feedback on any area where more work is required.


----------



## daveh (Sep 3, 2001)

Pete77 said:


> Surely if you are going to all the trouble of running the party anyway you might as well invite as many guests as possible to get the maximum possible feedback on any area where more work is required.


But I see you are already cluttering up the other forum with your interminable meanderings so probably would be the last person to be invited especially if progress has to be made. All it would need would be VM Waring to join you and the party would be complete.


----------



## healeydave (Jun 4, 2003)

Talking on behalf of the alt epg project, since we have no idea how many users there will be, it's impossible to know at the moment how well we will fare.

I'm sure there will be problems at the beginning.
I'm sure there a possibility the data may be inferior and will improve as we go along.
I'm sure pete77 will be the first one to complain, he's already won the acclaim of being the first one to gripe about the service before we have even started.
I'm sure about one more thing, it will at least be better than the alternative!


----------



## spitfires (Dec 19, 2006)

> progress has to be made


Quite. The focus at the moment is on getting _something _working for June 1st - the last thing the project needs is a load of people coming up with "but it would be nice if it did ..." ideas - save those for later!

There is also still a moral argument against disseminating the new epg; just because TiVo Inc. appear to have acted like b'stards over the closure of the TiVo service (although we don't know how much they were hog-tied by VM in that matter), our British sense of fair play says we shouldn't release an alternative EPG while the official service is still being provided. It just wouldn't be cricket.

.


----------



## alek (May 22, 2008)

spitfires said:


> our British sense of fair play says we shouldn't release an alternative EPG while the official service is still being provided. It just wouldn't be cricket.
> 
> .


The official service is being provided without charge. So there is really no argument against providing an alternative.

Alek


----------



## Fred Smith (Oct 5, 2002)

Pete77 who has told you you *have* to use the new EPG service. If you don't want to, don't bother. Others like myself are eagerly awaiting it. I doubt it will be perfect from the start but it will be better than nothing and like any new product on the market will improve with time and *useful* feedback from users.


----------



## gazter (Aug 1, 2001)

Virgin are planning on providing media services via tivos over high speed fibre optic networks that they do not own.... This in response to a conversation i had with head of public affairs and policy at virgin media.

To quote:

"Below is a release about a trial in Crumlin, Wales which we put out in July last year which proved we can deliver our next generation TV services across a passive fibre network. That was using the same technology as we propose we would deploy across Fujitsu's proposed network. That would mean access to linear channels and our on demand library via our new TiVo box"


----------



## LarryDavid (Jan 4, 2007)

gazter said:


> Virgin are planning on providing media services via tivos over high speed fibre optic networks that they do not own.... This in response to a conversation i had with head of public affairs and policy at virgin media.
> 
> To quote:
> 
> "Below is a release about a trial in Crumlin, Wales which we put out in July last year which proved we can deliver our next generation TV services across a passive fibre network. That was using the same technology as we propose we would deploy across Fujitsu's proposed network. That would mean access to linear channels and our on demand library via our new TiVo box"


If this is true, I think this deserves its own thread starting for more discussion


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Indeed.


----------



## martink0646 (Feb 8, 2005)

daveh said:


> But I see you are already cluttering up the other forum with your interminable meanderings so probably would be the last person to be invited especially if progress has to be made. All it would need would be *VM Waring* to join you and the party would be complete.


daveh,

I actually laughed out loud to this & got some funny looks

I actually think I have got pete all wrong. I always thought he was an obnoxious wum, always taking the course of most resistance but looking back I truly think that he doesn't realise how crass his statements are & how much he 'upsets' people. Maybe he's deserving of our sympathy or maybe he suffers from Aspbergers & doesn't have the same empathy mechanisms as the rest of the human race? I can't think of any other reason why he would trash the voluntary hard work, lost weekends & late nights of a group of people working for his benefit. Maybe there is a way to block his TiVo from updating until he apologises?

Martin


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

gazter said:


> Virgin are planning on providing media services via tivos over high speed fibre optic networks that they do not own.... This in response to a conversation i had with head of public affairs and policy at virgin media.


By that do they mean over BT Infinity (aka Fibre To the Cabinet - FTTC) or do they mean they would need a Fibre To The Home connection?

BT Infinity is due to arrive on both my own phone exchange and on my my mother's telephone exchange next January.

Both I and my mother have old CRT sets in need of replacement but in both locations we are holding off until digital switchover is complete to see what the actual range of receivable Freeview Muxes will be (both locations are extremely marginal for the existing Freeview signal and can only receive some Muxes on a basis that fluctuates with time of day and weather conditions and may or may not need an aerial upgrade after signal strength is boosted following digital switchover) and hence whether Freesat or Freeview would be the better route to take.

However if Virgin and their Tivo can reach either location over BT Infinity then I am sure this would be a preferable solution. To my mind BT's current investment in BT Infinity cabling does not make much sense unless they also plan to start to sell access to competitors on a wholesale basis which they find almost as profitable as selling it through BT Retail.


----------



## orangeboy (Apr 19, 2004)

Pete77 said:


> My advice would be for UK Series 1 owners to start posting on the US Tivocommunity forums and the VirginMedia Tivo forum on the issue as nobody is going to take any interest in the matter in the UK tivocommunity forum sections.


Living in the 'States, I do follow along with what's happening to the UK TiVo S1 users only to prepare for what _may_ happen in the future globally*. I'm just wondering what impact US residents would have.

*There's no evidence other than FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) that TiVo is going out of business. I just like to expect the best, and plan for the worst.



Pete77 said:


> Nearly three months have gone by since the announcement of The End and there is only a month left to go now.


It seems you have high expectations indeed!
TiVo was started in 1997, but didn't release their first product until two years later in 1999. Sure, there was more to work on than just guide data, BUT there was a concerted effort by the whole company, with communication between the various TiVo teams to get everything going. The external team making efforts to create a compatible alternative to the official guide data doesn't have the luxury of such communication, and only have a view from the outside as to how things are done internally at TiVo to get something up and going.



healeydave said:


> Talking on behalf of the alt epg project, since we have no idea how many users there will be, it's impossible to know at the moment how well we will fare.
> 
> I'm sure there will be problems at the beginning.
> I'm sure there a possibility the data may be inferior and will improve as we go along...


Have you guys contacted Tribune Media Services to see if they have an API that you could use and/or license? I suppose there may be a conflict of interest with TMS until June 1 providing guide data to UK TiVo users, but after that date, I would suspect that you would just be another customer...



spitfires said:


> Quite. The focus at the moment is on getting _something _working for June 1st - the last thing the project needs is a load of people coming up with "but it would be nice if it did ..." ideas - save those for later!
> 
> There is also still a moral argument against disseminating the new epg; just because TiVo Inc. appear to have acted like b'stards over the closure of the TiVo service (although we don't know how much they were hog-tied by VM in that matter), our British sense of fair play says we shouldn't release an alternative EPG while the official service is still being provided. It just wouldn't be cricket.
> 
> .


I like you guys! :up:


----------



## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

orangeboy said:


> Have you guys contacted Tribune Media Services to see if they have an API that you could use and/or license?


Way too costly, especially considering the alternative EPG will be provided free!


Ian_m said:


> A mate of mine involved in PVR development (yes still going on in UK, but not TiVo) says 5K per month [would be too little]
> 
> 14 day EPG, for re-distribution, costs a lot more than this, why do you think most Freeview/Sat EPG is only 7 days. He estimates about £10k per month at least to get 14-21 day EPG data, then you need all the computers, servers and staff costs and you are soon into £20-30K odd per month running costs.


----------



## orangeboy (Apr 19, 2004)

mikerr said:


> Way too costly, especially considering the alternative EPG will be provided free!


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> By that do they mean over BT Infinity (aka Fibre To the Cabinet - FTTC) or do they mean they would need a Fibre To The Home connection?


They are pitching it as part of Fujitsu's currently vapourware fibre-to-home system. It presumably COULD work over BT Infinity, but I'd have thought Virgin would make it conditional on them providing the ISP service.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

TCM2007 said:


> They are pitching it as part of Fujitsu's currently vapourware fibre-to-home system. It presumably COULD work over BT Infinity, but I'd have thought Virgin would make it conditional on them providing the ISP service.


I'm sure that Virgin would be your ISP just as they already can be my ADSL ISP on my BT Openreach owned line and exchange card. All we are talking about is BT Openreach making their DSLAMs available in their fibre cabled cabinets to other parties.

Of course at the moment the only model for such competition is LLU with rival ISPs having their own nonetheless BT Openreach engineer installed and maintained DSLAM in each exchange connected to a backhaul fibre cable or at least part of the capacity of that cable that only they can use. However were that model to be extended to Fibre To the Cabinet then I can't really see how it will be cost effect effective for each rival operator to run their own cable to each individual street cabinet.

The bottom line is the government wants there to more competition in more exchanges at ever faster speeds but it does not want streets to be dug up more often to achieve this and nor does Virgin want to dig up any more streets as a means of extending its presence as it is not cost effective for then to do so. Other possible options seem to also include long range WiMax in rural areas but this seems to be a technology that is long on talk and very short on implementation.

Let us hope it will happen and Virgin will find a way to cheaply extend their high speed network presence without the current required levels of capital investment but I will remain sceptical that this can actually happen until Virgin actually specify any firm plans for such a roll out in any areas where they do not have currently have their own fibre optic cable network.


----------

