TiVo Chief Touts Consumer Choice
In his testimony before the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet on Thursday, TiVo CEO Thomas Rogers said the panel was "uniquely positioned to shape the future of television." In this new consumer-controlled era, he said, it is crucial that lawmakers ensure choice among video providers and not get "derailed by incumbent interests that are threatened by innovation and competition."
In his written testimony, he said one of the biggest potential threats to his firm is the prospect of CableCARDs (which are used to view and record digital television) being "rendered useless" by video distributors' technologies that could limit the number of channels received by consumers who have the devices.
"Retail CableCARD devices must not be placed at a competitive disadvantage versus cable supplied set-top boxes," Rogers said. "The subcommittee must ensure that competitive retail set-top boxes have access to all of the television programming that consumers would expect to get from a cable set-top box," he said.
Interestingly, Rogers served as chief counsel to the subcommittee in the 1980s. He told Chairman Edward Markey, D-Mass., that he was "exceedingly uncomfortable" testifying before his alma mater. "I'm not sure if it's like being a cheering alum returning to a football game or a former student returning for disciplinary action," he said.
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