[mythtv-users] Cornucopia of the Commons

[David Maher]

I would be worried about information about our viewing habits being exploited by unscrupulous advertisers and by tv stations to target advetising at particular groups and possibly to further reduce the diversity of tv programming, by programming more of the "most watched" programs 

-----Original Message-----
From: mythtv-users-bounces at mythtv.org [mailto:mythtv-users-bounces at mythtv.org]On Behalf Of Dean Collins
Sent: Thursday, 11 August 2005 8:07 AM
To: Discussion about mythtv
Subject: RE: [mythtv-users] Cornucopia of the Commons



Hi Michael,

Yep, I have already posted several times about how I would like to fund some type of imdb style rating /review system just for myth tv users with no reply.

 

Dean

 

 


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From: mythtv-users-bounces at mythtv.org [mailto:mythtv-users-bounces at mythtv.org] On Behalf Of Michael Tiller
Sent: Wednesday, 10 August 2005 5:56 PM
To: Discussion about mythtv
Subject: [mythtv-users] Cornucopia of the Commons

 

I was sitting around contemplating my MythTV setup the other day and it occurred to me that with the number of deployed MythTV boxes, there should be some really interesting "social" possibilities.  Perhaps this has already been discussed, but it seems to me that the open nature of MythTV would make these relatively easy to add.

The specific case I was thinking about was what to watch on TV.  TiVo has its suggestions capability and I do miss that.  But MythTV could do much better.  Instead of looking at my viewing habits and trying to guess what I'd like, what if you looked at my viewing habits and then compared them with viewing habits of other MythTV owners?  If you were somehow able to compile all the viewing information (in an opt-in, privacy friendly way of course), then you could pretty easily identify patterns.  So if I record "Law & Order" and "Numb3rs" and it notices that most people who record those shows also record "The Closer" then it would point that out to me.

This could be just like the online commerce approach of "people who bought this also bought...".

This kind of capability wouldn't just have to rely on past data, it could see into the future.  It could recognize patterns in what people with similar interests will record in the future.

I wonder if commercial identification could work in a similar way...combining information about what the various commercial identifying algorithms identified along with information about what parts of a program people fast-forwarded or skipped through to create a nearly definitive map of a broadcast (of course, this requires that time pass and some people have already watched the episode, but I'm just brainstorming here).

As I said, perhaps this has been discussed before, I don't know.  I thought it was an interesting idea and reflects many trends in how social data is being handled (e.g. http://del.icio.us).

If I had the time, I'd probably try and implement something myself.  But being overcommitted already with other obligations, I'm afraid I have little to offer such a project except perhaps some ideas, user feedback and encouragement. :-(

--
Mike

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