TiVo Selling Data on Users' Watching Habits

Gyppo writes "The San Francisco Chronicle reports that TiVo is collecting and selling data on what parts of broadcasts people are rewinding for review and what commercials they are skipping. The data collection is part of a service the company provides to advertisers and television networks, collecting anonymous data on their users' commercial-watching habits. The data they provide is a random subset of their overall userbase, detailing which commercials are skipped and which are actually watched. The article mentions the possibility for privacy abuse, but with this application of technology Tivo is not providing access to what any one individual user watches via the service."

Re:And why am I not surprised?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd love to know who they're selling it to, though. Choicepoint comes to mind... and that's a very scary thing, letting prospective employers know what I watch.

Except they're not selling individually identifiable information. What they're selling is aggregate data (eg, 12% of commercial skippers went back and watched the new ad for Colgate). Then again, I shouldn't expect you to know that, since it's only mentioned in the summary...

Re:in CCCP

[SnowZero]

Do you mean disclosure such as Tivo's privacy policy [tivo.com], which says what data they will collect, and what they will do with it? So I guess you mean this can happen in Canada, since Tivo has told people all along that they'd be collecting this information.

There is nothing to see here. It took less than 30 seconds to find Tivo's policy on viewing habbits data.

Old News

[Alvin_Maker]

This is old news. It is also very easy to opt-out. Just call Tivo customer service (1-877-367-8486) and let them know.

Duplicate article

[ptomblin]

I know that the collective memory of the Slashdot moderators is less than a day, but this story came out during the 2004 Superbowl:
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/03/18 31222 [slashdot.org]

Follow the Money. Data Mining!

[promodog]

I am sure data mining was a thought out revenue stream that TiVo had planned since it's inception.(One reason I never bought one.) Once a critical mass hits it's Tivo's usage, TiVo can sell on going, up to date statistics- Ratings better than Nielson. TiVo didn't build these only to make our lives easy. Follow the money.

this is called ratings.

[DragonTHC]

I support tivo doing this. as long as it's not personally identifiable information.
maybe fox wouldn't have cancelled firefly had they known how many people actually watched it.
I also like that they provide info on commercials.
this is the first time, I believe, outside of focus groups that companies have feedback on their commercials.
I personally skip every commercial I can.

Re:And why am I not surprised?

[SnowZero]

Why assume anything [tivo.com], when Tivo spells out exactly what they are doing. Of course, you assumed this information didn't exist, and didn't bother to take the 30 seconds to find it.

Re:Note who Tivo considers its "clients" to be...

[cultrhetor]

I hate to be the word police. I really do, but I've seen this word "monitize," (correctly spelled "monetize") creeping into a number of posts. It does not mean what you think it means. To "Monetize" something is to give it legal value as currency. The word you're thinking of is "commodify," or to turn into a commodity (an item for sale).

That is all. Thank you.