Giving people the chance to distribute TV shows online will undoubtedly draw unwanted legal attention

Same fundamentally flawed argument that I've heard ever since I got my TiVo.

I invite anybody who believes this to get their favorite IRC client and get on irc.emory.edu channels: #tv-rips, #tv-episodes, #darkangeltv, #that70sshow, and dozens of other channels full of traders.

For the IRC impaired, go hit http://www.vcdhelp.com/capture.htm for capture instructions using all sorts of PC cards.

If nothing else, there's a handful of VCD burners that work just like VCR's - except digitally. You can then take the burned VCD to your computer, cut out the commercials, and reburn on a new CD, or convert to an AVI and trade on IRC. VCD's can be played in almost any standalone DVD player and the media is a standard CDROM - about 40 cents each in packs of 50.

TiVo is just another medium in an ever expanding list of choices. Except it has a fairly high barrier of entry: Over $500 and significant technical knowledge. PC Capture cards cost about $250 are Windows Plug and Play and have detailed instructions on use, the TiVonet cost me $200 by itself - twice what Salon claims.

I have to be honest here -- if Tivo is reading this -- if data on the harddrive becomes encrypted as of version 2.5 of the software, I will simply do what I can to remove the ability of the system to upgrade the software, and should that not work, I will cancel the service on the three tivos I have and use a different product.

I will also support in any way possible the people who will be working to circumvent that encryption, with the full knowledge that such an activity is not, in fact, illegal since, even with the Nazi-like DMCA, the creation or use of decryption software isn't illegal unless its used to circumvent copyright -- and Tivo does not hold copyright or license on the program data recorded on my non-DirectTV Tivo.

It may be a risky legal arena right now, but anyone with an ounce of brains would realize that Tivo is not in fact anything like Napster. Tivo is like any of the hundreds of makers of MP3-ripping software. They may upset the studios, but the people making these decisions in the studios are individuals of extravagent igorance to believe that its easier to hack a Tivo to extract data than to buy a $80 MPEG-2 capture card and put it in your PC with nice user-friendly software.

Many of the interviews in the article were with equally ignorant people who it seemed to me were just bucking for their moment in the spotlight.

Lets all hope Tivo does the right thing here, because Netpliance learned the hard way what happens when you sell a product at a loss and individuals buying that hardware choose to not use the service you are selling.