Oh No my Tivo thinks i’m gay

October 6th, 2004

Mediapost looks at the issues of personalisation for TV and the internet and touches on the mobile phone.

All very interesting when SMLXL have a view that providing products and services which enhances the life of the individual is the future, and therefore this cultural shift has some bearing on how we consume media and how we receive marketing communications.

Today, people are constantly editing their lives.

How much personalisation do we want? well, I guess its down to the individual.

On the subject on TV and the individual, mediapost’s author David Berkowitz says:

Even with 500 channels, personalization was a non-issue for TV until TiVo and friends came along to shake things up. This led to ad skipping, being able to watch your two favorite shows that are (without fail) always on at the same time, and the classic Jeffrey Zaslow article in “The Wall Street Journal” from December 2002, “Oh No! My TiVo Thinks I’m Gay.”

Zaslow astutely wrote, “A lot of gadgets and websites feature ‘personalization technologies’ that profile consumers by tracking what they watch, listen or buy. Many consumers appreciate having computers delve into their hearts and heads. But some say it gives them the willies…”

TiVo and other personal video recorders (PVRs) have learned a few things from the search space, namely allowing people to find and access content on their own terms.

The death of mass media as we knew it has arrived. The death of siloed approaches to marketing has also arrived. The death knoll for many business models has sounded, as our business/cultural landscape evolves driven by the economic wave of change.

Threat or opportunity, well you can make your own personal decision.

Addtional reading: Context is king

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