# Tivo Bolt Jump Mode



## bradleys (Oct 31, 2007)

Commercial skipping for "select" channels. Press the letter 'D' and skips the entire commercial.

Very interesting! 

Damn, I was going to go grab the video and they changed the site back!


----------



## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

But will it work 100% of the time? I don't see the point if it doesn't work every time.


----------



## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

Good question. I'd guess there would be some identifiers to let you know you can autoskip a particular recording though.


----------



## thefisch (Jul 25, 2015)

Isn't this the same stuff other dvr's like ReplayTV got in hot water over?


----------



## bradleys (Oct 31, 2007)

Each channel that supported jump had an icon. I suspect they are getting a little extra something from those channels.


----------



## dswallow (Dec 3, 2000)

They're having people (aka humans) watch the programs and create necessary metadata to enable the feature for them.


----------



## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

dswallow said:


> They're having people (aka humans) watch the programs and create necessary metadata to enable the feature for them.


Then it should be very accurate. An automated system would not be.


----------



## toughcrowd (Feb 9, 2005)

Instead of hitting the 30 second button 4-5 times you hit a button once. Nice? Would totally be worth downloading the software update this should be, but actually spending money to upgrade from a superior Roamio is nuts.


----------



## Series3Sub (Mar 14, 2010)

thefisch said:


> Isn't this the same stuff other dvr's like ReplayTV got in hot water over?


Not exactly. I believe Replay cut out the commercials or if it did skip, it did so WITHOUT user action to do so, a key legal point allowing what otherwise would be violation of copyright, but I think it was Replay's ability to move content that had not been cleared by the copyright owners of the content that got them in worse hot water. Dish AutoHop and TiVo Commercial Skip merely pass or SKIP the commercial break similar the 30 second skip button. A further distinction is that Dish's AutoHop requires layer of action by the user to run AutoHop as opposed to the Replay not requiring user action to skip or cut the commercials, or at least Dish felt the need for user initiation to playback in AutoHop meeting court precedence requiring "user action" to allow what otherwise would be violation of copyright. However, our Supreme Court did not rule according to the law in the Aereo case.

Dish's AutoHop uses real people so that the programming in NEVER cut. It was rumored DirecTV had its own commercial skipping feature, but was waiting for the whole Dish vs. Big Nets case to be resolved. I was really surprised that TiVo includes such a Commercial Skip feature on the Bolt.

BTW, the 9th Circuit's ruling a few years ago of upholding the trial judge's refusal to grant a _*preliminary injunction*_ requiring Dish to disable AutoHop while the trail proceeds, explains, in detail, the whole process Dish uses to achieve the AutoHop and makes crystal clear that the plaintiff's (the big broadcast networks) had virtually no chance of prevailing, and it was soon after that Disney and CBS came to an agreement for reauthorizing re-transmission rights with both companies dropping their suits and accepting AutoHop, but did get Dish to agree to abide by the C3 and C7 (number of days from broadcast a commercial counts as being counted as viewed when playing back the recording before activating the AutoHop for that show recording.

FWIW, the reason humans are used for Commercial Skip and AutoHop is that if ANY portion of the program/show is skipped, it would be a violation of copyright. So, those markers at the start and end of a commercial break MUST BE accurate. There is NO ROOM FOR ERROR. The 9th Curcuit made clear that Dish could have AutoHop skip the commercials because the broadcast nets do NOT hold copyrights to the ads/commercials. So the game is to leave the programming untouched, but place markers at the start and end of the break. The experience with Dish's Autohop is that we do see the first 2 seconds of the first commercial, and then it AutoHops to just the last few seconds of the final commercial. IMHO, this is done to be certain the markers are as far from the programmings as reasonable and has no chance of cutting out any of the programming. Dish isn't (and possible TiVo) taking a chance. Better to have a few seconds of commercial at start and end rather than cut even a few seconds of programming.

Further, the 9th did state in its ruling that the ONLY point upon which the broadcast nets could prevail is the broadcast nets contention that the copy of the programming that Dish uses for evaluation purposes in the AutoHop marking process does, indeed, appear to violate the broadcast nets contractual prohibition of any unauthorized coping of its programming. However, the 9th pointed out that the broadcast nets would have to demonstrate loss or damages from the copy of its programming by Dish, and the 9th ruling stated that considering that the copy Dish made for the purpose of internal quality control and that it is only seen by a very small number of people (less than 10, I think), it would be next to impossible for the broadcast nets to prove loss or damages due to the evaluation copy Dish makes. All hope the broadcast nets had was devastated by this ruling. Even though the nets still pursued their law suits against Dish, they must have known they "lost" or had no case after the 9th's ruling, and both Les Moonves and Bob Iger negotiated re-transmission agreements that allowed AutoHop to stay, and after Les Moonves earlier vowed to kill it, and saying, "no way," to AutoHop.

The point of the above is just that what TiVo is doing with its commercial skip is LEGAL and has already been indirectly affirmed by the courts and shouldn't face any legal challenges if TiVo does it properly, and it seems they are, especially having real people ensure no mistakes. It seems TiVo has reviewed the whole Dish AutoHop vs. broadcast nets and come to their conclusion, with the help of its own attorneys, that they feel confident in the legality of adding TiVo Commercial Skip feature. While the TiVo Commercial Skip is not a compelling feature to me (none of the Bolt is compelling to me, I like my Roamios), it is still GREAT that TiVo has included such a feature and I hope others follow. I really do think TiVo has now upped the anti, and I can't help but think DirecTV will implement its own, long rumored, commercial skip tech and maybe even the cable cos., too, some time next year.

I also think the Quick View is a good feature (again, it does not compel me to buy Bolt as my Roamios are are just fine). I still have my JVC S-VHS machine that has such a similar feature at 1.5X faster than normal and I was using it as recently as last month for several months to watch old Match Games because I needed to save time.

Except for those two new features, the Bolt seems hardly any different from the S5 line. The physical box is the most different thing about the Bolt, but still a Roamio in spirit and function.


----------



## bradleys (Oct 31, 2007)

It sounds like they are staffing people to locate the break points, so I wonder how long it will take for a recorded show to grab the data. 

This sounds like something well suited to be crowd sourced...


----------



## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

For more information:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10647245#post10647245


----------



## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

bradleys said:


> It sounds like they are staffing people to locate the break points, so I wonder how long it will take for a recorded show to grab the data.
> 
> This sounds like something well suited to be crowd sourced...


I would hope the TiVo would be downloading the info at 15 minutes intervals at least. If not even shorter intervals.


----------



## thefisch (Jul 25, 2015)

Series3Sub, thanks for the detailed response. Makes sense based on the technicalities of the law and different approaches.

The good news is my kids will be excited that you can get a job to watch TV and mark the commercials.


----------



## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

I just watched the CNBC interview with Tom Rogers and it's not quite clear how skip mode actually works. Does it physically skip the entire block like the back door 30 second skip? Or does it just automatically FF past the commercials like the 30 second scan mode?

I'm a little torn actually. I kind of like FFing because if I see something I want to watch, like a trailer for a movie or a commercial with a hot chick , I can back up and watch it. If it actually skips over the whole block then I'll never even see enough to know that I missed something I might have wanted to see.


----------



## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Dan203 said:


> I just watched the CNBC interview with Tom Rogers and it's not quite clear how skip mode actually works. Does it physically skip the entire block like the back door 30 second skip? Or does it just automatically FF past the commercials like the 30 second scan mode?
> 
> I'm a little torn actually. I kind of like FFing because if I see something I want to watch, like a trailer for a movie or a commercial with a hot chick , I can back up and watch it. If it actually skips over the whole block then I'll never even see enough to know that I missed something I might have wanted to see.


That is why I liked the 30 second scan fucntion. I used to love the 30 second skip function but I like to be able to see what I'm missing and back up and watch if I want.


----------



## tarheelblue32 (Jan 13, 2014)

thefisch said:


> The good news is my kids will be excited that you can get a job to watch TV and mark the commercials.


They probably have people in India doing it for $1.50/hr. And they won't get to watch the shows. They will have to FF through the programs to get to the commercials faster. And eventually computer algorithms will probably be doing it.


----------



## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

I'm going to bet that this is similar to 30 second scan. The biggest issue they're trying to solve here is over shoot. An automated FF works just as well as a simple skip for that. Plus an automated FF has benefits to both consumers, as we described, and content providers by not completely blowing by their commercials. In either case it's a welcome addition.


----------



## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

tarheelblue32 said:


> They probably have people in India doing it for $1.50/hr. And they won't get to watch the shows. They will have to FF through the programs to get to the commercials faster. And eventually computer algorithms will probably be doing it.


There is probably a prescan by a computer that marks the areas where commercials are most likely located and the human simply verifies them and adjusts them as needed.


----------



## kbmb (Jun 22, 2004)

Dan203 said:


> I'm going to bet that this is similar to 30 second scan. The biggest issue they're trying to solve here is over shoot. An automated FF works just as well as a simple skip for that. Plus an automated FF has benefits to both consumers, as we described, and content providers by not completely blowing by their commercials. In either case it's a welcome addition.


Based on this review:
http://www.digitaltrends.com/dvrs-digital-video-recorders-reviews/tivo-bolt-review/

It looks like it literally jumps you to the next segment. So you can even keep pressing D to jump to each segment of the show, kind of like the Skip to Tick now.

-Kevin


----------



## tarheelblue32 (Jan 13, 2014)

kbmb said:


> Based on this review:
> http://www.digitaltrends.com/dvrs-digital-video-recorders-reviews/tivo-bolt-review/
> 
> It looks like it literally jumps you to the next segment. So you can even keep pressing D to jump to each segment of the show, kind of like the Skip to Tick now.
> ...


I wonder if they will put actual tick marks on the progress bar where the commercials are. That would be kinda cool.


----------



## zerdian1 (Apr 19, 2015)

aaronwt said:


> But will it work 100% of the time? I don't see the point if it doesn't work every time.


The Commercial Skip is a first step for TiVo.
They bowed out of Commercial Skip wars a decade or so ago and let ReplayTV fight the battles and virtually go bankrupt fighting the networks and media companies.

This time TiVo let DISH Network fight the battles on Commercial Skip which DISH has had on their HOPPER for several years now. 
Basically you select the Dish Hopper Commercial Skip once for any video and it skips all commercials for the entire video. The red kangaroo usually only works with prime time recorded TV shows and not videos recorded on another channel other than the 4 main stations: NBC, ABC, CBS & FOX and only those shows that the networks mark as skippable in their agreement with Dish. One of the network requirements was that Dish Hopper could only activate the commercial skip overnight on shows it recorded the previous day and evening.

PRIME TIME IS 8PM TO 11PM M-SAT AND 7PM TO 11PM SUN FOR NBC, ABC, CBS & FOX.
DISH HOPPER COMMERCIAL SKIP IS FOR PRIME TIME RECORDED SHOWS ONLY.

TiVo's BOLT requires the viewer to manually push the green D button the skip that set of commercials. The viewer will have to push that button again in a few minutes at the next commercial break.

None of these systems is perfect. I have been using versions of commercial skip since the late 1970's with my early VCRs.
In my experience the DISH Hopper Commercial Skip is one of the best I have used so far.

But at my new condo on the Ocean, I am not allowed to put any DISHes on the roof.
So I have settled for COMCAST Cable and for the 17.5TB TiVo DVR system.

I still get to use and have my DISH Network Satellite and my 16TB DISH Hopper and Joey System in my other Beach House during the summer.
My Dish Hopper System already has 4K streaming video.

I figure that the TV Networks have already allowed Dish Hopper to operate for about 4 years now and it has been a very small issue.
This combined with a recent study where 85% of TV Viewers watch their TV at its regularly scheduled time every day.
On 15% of TV Viewing is using the DVR's capability to record shows and watch prerecorded shows.
Something I have been doing for decades with banks of VCRs each recording one station for up to 6 hours at a time.

I still might get one BOLT to use for my viewing.
SKIP: If I can commercial skip on shows on my TiVo Roamio PROs while viewing them on my TiVo Bolt.
SPEED: If I can speed up a show that was recorded and stored on a roamio PRO and play it back on my TiVo Bolt.
4K: If I can watch 4K video on my Bolt that may be sorted on another device.


----------



## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

zerdian1 said:


> The Commercial Skip is a first step for TiVo.
> They bowed out of Commercial Skip wars a decade or so ago and let ReplayTV fight the battles and virtually go bankrupt.
> 
> This time they let DISH Network fight the battles on Commercial Skip which DISH has had on their HOPPER for several years now. Basically you select the Dish Hopper Commercial Skip once for any vide and it skips all commercials for the entire video. The red kangaroo usually only works with prime time recorded TV shows and not videos recorded on another channel other than the 4 main stations: NBC, ABC, CBS & FOX


TiVos implimentation is a little different. You still have to manually press a button to skip each individual break. So their version is probably a little less offensive to the content providers.


----------



## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

zerdian1 said:


> The Commercial Skip is a first step for TiVo.
> They bowed out of Commercial Skip wars a decade or so ago and let ReplayTV fight the battles and virtually go bankrupt fighting the networks and media companies.
> 
> This time TiVo let DISH Network fight the battles on Commercial Skip which DISH has had on their HOPPER for several years now. Basically you select the Dish Hopper Commercial Skip once for any vide and it skips all commercials for the entire video. The red kangaroo usually only works with prime time recorded TV shows and not videos recorded on another channel other than the 4 main stations: NBC, ABC, CBS & FOX and only those shows that the networks mark as skippable in their agreement with Dish. One of the network requirements was that Dish Hopper could only activate the commercial skip overnight on shows it recorded the previous day and evening.
> ...


That 85% number is still amazing to me. Even thirty years the vast majority of my TV watching was time shifted.


----------



## reneg (Jun 19, 2002)

Dan203 said:


> There is probably a prescan by a computer that marks the areas where commercials are most likely located and the human simply verifies them and adjusts them as needed.


Once the commercials are identified, I wonder if the skip is as simple as a RPC command from the mind server. Perhaps, : videoPlaybackPositionSet


----------



## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

I sure hope they don't miss the 'extra bits' put into some commercial breaks.. E.g. Mythbusters does it, Naked & Afraid does it, probably other shows I can't think of at the moment do it.. Basically, a VERY short (~15-30 second often) segment in one of the commercial breaks that's very easy to accidentally miss.


----------



## tatergator1 (Mar 27, 2008)

I've been meaning to search back for a post several months ago that was ringing a bell with regards to Jump Mode. The thread didn't see much posting action, but I'm thinking these are the people behind Jump Mode.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=527645

The job posting links are now dead, but some of the specifics made it into subsequent postings in this thread. Specifically,



> Originally Posted by unitron View Post
> Tagging Specialist (3148)
> 
> http://raleigh.craigslist.org/tch/4978552958.html





> The main duties of this position are as follows:
>  Watching video content (such as television shows, movies, sports, etc.)


----------



## CIP54 (Dec 29, 2000)

this sure looks like a software implementation. Any word on allowing all of us with old fashioned lifetime roamios in on the fun?


----------



## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

CIP54 said:


> this sure looks like a software implementation. Any word on allowing all of us with old fashioned lifetime roamios in on the fun?


They've said that at this time they do not plan to offer the feature on the Roamio. Although since they still sell the Roamio Pro, and will continue to do so for at least another year, I'm betting they change their policy on that. Although I could see them charging an extra fee for it on lifetime units since there is some manpower involved in making it work.


----------

