I've downloaded almost all the episodes from iTunes Music Store (my connection is limited to Airport right now so it takes a couple hours per download). If they never put it out on DVD at least I'll have it in some form. I hope Fox will allow the finished eps to be on the iTunes Music Store. One of the cool things about that format is that record companies are making music available that they own the rights to but don't feel like doing a CD release for. I hope TV and film companies will follow that lead.

Hey, my Tivo still shows the next two eps airing. I'll clap my hands and believe in fairies for that not to change.

I love the fact that about an hour after the Variety article, people started filtering online saying 'Hey, I just saw an advert for House on Monday at 9, what's going on:@!' It's like round about TV - one out, one in.

I'm still in denial Drive is canceled, I think.

Well, damn. I'm sorry, Kristen & Tim. Not your fault. You did damn fine work and I for one was enjoying it.

I got to thinking about the subtracting Tivo watchers, though, and I have to say I understand that. Someone was saying, oh, you can't tell if I've gotten up to get a snack during the commercials, and it occurred to me that you can't tell about any of my viewing patterns. My Tivo is on all day and night, watching television to itself. Tivo can't tell if I've got the actual television on or not. All they can see is if I'm watching the taped stuff (with no commercials). Otherwise, it thinks I'm watching a lot of bull riding and fishing, because I tend to leave it on VS after the hockey. So it's probably valid to subtract out those numbers, my actual viewing habits notwithstanding.

But it can tell if you interact with the program, pausing it or FF or whatever. And there are few shows I actually watch that I don't interact with.

Tivo has, in my opinion, some of the most valuable viewer statistics around. They don't just know what you watch, but how you watch it. All at once, in chunks, rewinding certain bits, pausing, which ads you watch, if you rewatch shows, when you choose to watch things, how long you keep things.. The skipping ad thing, of course, makes most of that useless. In the UK we have DVRs, but they don't include ad skipping as the advertising industry got legal action happy.

How can they not include ad skipping?

Tivos don't technically have ad-skipping either, just the ability to fast-forward. (It's possible to hack your remote to skip ahead in 30-second chunks, but it's not a built-in ability.)

Yeah, don't you have a ff option?

I thought we were talking about fast forwarding. My DVR doesn't have specific ad-skipping.

Right. So, I'm trying to figure out how one would lose that functionality and still have a functional DVR.