TiVo’s skip button changed how we watch TV forever
1Reported today on The Verge
For the full article visit: https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/21/21136537/tivo-skip-button-tv-dvr-fast-forward
Reported today in The Verge.
TiVo's skip button changed how we watch TV forever
In today's digital age, it sometimes feels like hardware has taken a back seat to the software that drives our devices. Button of the Month will look at what some of those buttons and switches are like on devices old and new to appreciate how we interact with them on a physical, tactile level.
For years, the word TiVo was synonymous with DVRs. Launched back in the heady days of 1999, the product came on the scene and quickly changed how we watched TV forever - and it all started with a button on its remote that represented a major leap forward in technology.
Before TiVo, you could record shows from a live broadcast on VHS tapes, but the process was limited and costly. You'd need a VCR that could record shows plus the tapes themselves, which cost extra money and took up space. For all that, the technology was still limited; recordings had to be made manually, every time. And while tapes were good for recording things to watch later, they didn't give you much control over a live broadcast while it was actually happening.
TiVo changed that by making recording digital. Suddenly, recording shows was easy and automated, and the digital nature of the recordings meant there were new ways to interact with them. A pause button let you stop in the middle of a live show or news broadcast to grab a snack, then come back right where you left off. Missed something? A rewind button allowed you to jump back a few seconds to catch it.
But then there is the most magical button of all: the skip button. It's the little arrow with a line next to it, and it paved the way for how we interact with digital TV by letting viewers jump freely around a TV show.
VHS recordings could be fast-forwarded, rewound, or pau