TiVo nation

The funeral of Pope John Paul II aired at 3 a.m., forcing millions of devoted Catholics and others wanting to watch to get up during the wee hours of the morning.

Not Danette Ketcher. She has a DVR.

"I just pushed a button and set it to record," she said. "I wasn't going to be up, so I just watched it the next day."

So? You could have done that with a VCR.

A DVR owner would laugh at the comparison.

Ketcher and the increasing number of people who are getting hooked on digital video recorders will tell you that DVRs are much more than a VCR and its complicated programming, piles of tapes and limited control.

"I basically would not live without it at this point," Ketcher said. "It's more than about liking it, which I do. But it lets me make my schedule and watch what I want when I want."

Ketcher, of Cape Girardeau, has had her DVR with her satellite service for four or five years. That was before there were 3 million TiVo subscribers. She believes she was probably one of the first in the area to get a DVR.

She fell in love with the features immediately -- features that VCRs don't have.

One function allows her to pause live television with it, handy when she is watching her favorite show and one of her three children needs attention. She simply has to push the pause button, grab their snack -- or deal with whatever crisis has popped up -- and then return to the show without having missed a second.

She can better coax her 7-year-old to bed from the middle of his favorite program by telling him she can quickly hit a button that will record the rest of it so he can watch it tomorrow.

She can rewind a live sporting event to catch that controversial call. She can also tell it to record her favorite shows and never have to worry about missing them again.

"You can forget the schedule and just watch your shows when you want to," she said.

That goes for whatever TV system you have. TiVos are the most popular brand, causing workers around the watercooler to say things like: "I TiVoed 'American Idol' last night."

If you have satellite, there's a system that includes a digital video recorder. Sometime this spring, Charter Communications will roll out its DVR, already popular in the St. Louis area with 3,000 subscribers.

While TiVo only allows you to record one show live, Charter DVR and satellite recorders have the capability to record two channels simultaneously while also viewing a previously recorded program.

Six percent of Americans own a TiVo or other digital video recorder and another 6 percent plan to buy one in the next year, a study finds.

Industry experts believe cable DVRs will continue to catch on. The financial firm Smith Barney estimates that about 3.2 million homes -- 4.7 percent of subscribers -- will have similar cable-provided DVRs by the end of 2005 and more than 42 percent by 2010.

And an overwhelming majority of DVR owners -- 81 percent -- say they "love" or "like" them, according to the joint study from Arbitron Inc. and Edison Media Research. More than half say the DVRs have had a "big impact" on their lives.

Among all recorders of television shows, including VCR owners, 29 percent cite the ability to skip ads as the primary reason for recording shows, while 52 percent want to watch shows at a more convenient time.

Those who don't record shows are evenly split between who say it's too difficult or time consuming and those who cite an unwillingness to decide ahead of time what they want to watch.

Dr. Jim Dufek, a mass communications professor who teaches television courses at Southeast Missouri State University, recently returned from the National Cable Telecommunications Association conference in San Francisco.

He said that DVR technology was one of the topics that was discussed.

"People who don't understand what DVR technology can do for you, once they have, some people would rather give up their cell phones than their DVRs," Dufek said. "That's how important it is to them that they can control their televisions."

Dufek agreed, however, that DVRs are probably just a stopgap until video-on-demand technology becomes available. That would allow people to select and download shows so they can be watched immediately.

"It is just a stepping stone to get to the ultimate, where we no longer have broadcast TV," Dufek said. "Your TV will be your computer, your phone, your information center, and when you want to watch a certain show, you'll pay for that individual show."

In the meantime, people seem content with their DVRs.

David Michel, owner of Down to Earth Satellite in Cape Girardeau, said he's had a DVR for several years. At first, there was only 10 hours of space available, but now you can get more than 160 hours, he said.

"The big thing that I've always seen it as is it frees you up to watch things when it's convenient for you, not the programmer," he said. "You don't have to glue yourself to the couch Thursday night at 7 p.m. to watch 'Survivor.' Those days are over."

Dan Frazier, of Jackson, also has a DVR.

"It makes our time our own again," he said.

Frazier has two children, who are heavily involved in gymnastics, karate and other activities.

"Now we can get done running them around, drop them off and come back home and we haven't missed anything," he said.

Frazier said he uses the pause function every day.

"People used to have to say, 'Leave me alone, I'm watching TV,'" he said. "Now I can pause it, answer their question and not miss anything."

Marcy Abernathy of Cape Girardeau got DISH Network's DVR within the last two months. She was intimidated when she saw the system sitting atop her television.

"By the end of the day though, I was through it and it was easy," she said.

Abernathy loves her DVR so much, she said she's promoting it to her friends.

"I'm trying to get everybody on it," she said. "You don't have to set the times and dates. You just scroll down from day to day and then go through the hours of the day. Then you just click on what you want to watch."

One drawback, she admitted, was that maybe she does watch more television now than she did before.

"I'm not a TV person," she said. "But I like to quilt and my husband likes to watch the races. So we probably watch more of those shows."

Chadd James, a merchandising manager with Stereo One in Cape Girardeau, said the business sells TiVos but also offers televisions with similar DVR technology built into them.

"That type of product is definitely in demand," he said. "There are so many products, so it's not necessarily TiVo. For the folks who are looking for this type of equipment, they absolutely love it."

smoyers@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 137