Unbox TiVo service

TiVo today ramped up competition with Apple by launching its Unbox on TiVo service, adding works from MGM Studios and Sony Pictures. Apple is planning to release its Apple TV set top box in the near future, hoping to snatch up a formidable portion of the market as it did with digital during the advent of the iPod. The new service launched with a promotional effort offering customers who sign up before May $15 in free downloads, according to Amazon. Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer yesterday spoke about the Apple TV at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference in San Francisco, presenting his aspirations for the device and touting the Cupertino-based company's recent addition of Paramount and Lionsgate -- which brought the number of movies on the iTunes store to over 400. Apple's financial chief also cited the track record of the iTunes Store, hinting that Apple hopes for similar growth with its Apple TV device.

"If I can think back to when we first launched iTunes, we started with 200,000 songs in our catalog and today we have over 4 million," Oppenheimer said. "When we launched with the fifth-generation iPod in October of 2005, um TV shows, we started with five. And today we have over 350. And as the end of last quarter, we downloaded more than 50 million TV shows. And we're confident that we'll add more studios over time."

by MacNN Staff