story

I'm getting more and more agitated with friends that have TiVo or DVR or whatever and dont get around to watching shows for a few days or even weeks, then getting really upset with me if I accidentally let a spoiler slip, or I want to talk about the episode and they haven't seen it yet.

They keep saying how TiVo lets them watch shows when they want to watch the shows, and that's fine I get it, but to what point does the rest of the world have to be quiet just because it hasn't been convenient enough for you to sit down and watch the show we all saw three weeks ago?

If anyone's been in the same boat as me, or if there are TiVo people that want to defent this mindset, I'd like to hear about it, but this really is beginning to bug me.

Birrman54

I'd say about a 7 - 10 DAYS spoiler free period, then it's their fault.


edit: damn you groucho!
birrman54

Groucho

I'm with birrman54. 7 - 10 weeks sound about right.

story

Seven to ten weeks?! Are you serious?! I'll give you until the next episode, that's it. My best friend loves AD, and he got super pissed when I sent him that animated gif someone posted of the close-up on Gob, George Michael, Sr. and Franklin's eyes because Franklin was new to him. Sorry, it had been a week - get over it!

tasha99

Why don't you have a Tivo?

Also, I think Birman54 meant 7-10 minutes.

Patman

Start making up shit when you discuss the episodes that your friend hasn't seen yet. That'll F-him up.

fujishig

I don't get it... you want to force them to talk about an episode even if they don't want you to?

I am an avid TIVO user, and my backlog can get pretty big at times. What that means to me is that I usually don't get to participate in discussion threads on this forum. But that's not unique to TIVO, and I don't see the big deal. Of course, your friends might be unreasonable if they get mad at you for "spoilering" stuff like characters appearing or whatever. Commercials can do that too.

I know, for instance, that if I don't watch Survivor or American Idol right away, someone will spoiler it for me, whether it's a friend, radio, or whatever. That's life. I try to avoid it, but sometimes you can't help it, and I can't get too mad about that.

But put it this way: are you going to spoil the endings of all the movies you've seen before your friends get to watch it? Isn't it common courtesy not to? You don't use the argument "well, you should've seen the movie by now, so too bad", do you? More likely, the friend will let it be known that he hasn't seen the movie, and you'll stop talking about it. After all, he's not going to be able to add much to the conversation if he has no idea what you're talking about, right?

BTW, get a TIVO.

BudSeriously

HEY! Groucho's always serious!

das Monkey

I don't get it either. What the fuck. If you're in a group of people talking about something, it's unfair of the TiVo guy to ask everyone else to be quiet just on his account; he should simply leave the room. However, if you just want to talk to him specifically, he has every right to watch whenever he feels like it and desire you don't ruin it for him. To expect otherwise is unbelievably selfish.

Asking someone if he's seen a movie before discussing the ending is one of the most basic human courtesies. There's no reason TV shows should be different. If the content of television shows is not that important to you, that's your choice, but have the decency to respect that your "best friend" does care. People who watch TV shows on delay have a responsibility to avoid spoilers on their own. On this forum, that means staying out of the discussion threads for those episodes. For shows like Survivor, it means avoiding news programs that would cover it. At work, it probably may mean steering clear of the water cooler. For the most part, the responsibility is on the delayed viewer, as he cannot expect the entire world to change to his quirks, and he has to be aware of that and not get overly upset when it happens. However, he should be able to reasonably expect that friends will not demand he talk about something he hasn't seen in one-on-one situations and suggest he "get over it" when they're too inconsiderate to preface a discussion with a simple, "have you seen ... yet?"

das

Mhepburn20

I would think until the next episode is usually resonable unless the person has told you otherwise. For instance, I am not going to watch ALIAS at all until the beginning of may. Thus I avoid the threads here and friends who watch it know that I am waiting to marathon this season.

Print media is pretty good at spoiling things lately also. LOST SPOILERS from the last episode:



My fault for waiting I suppose.

Achtung

It's just the sort of thing we Tivo owners will have to deal with until DVRs become more popular. If I overhear something at work dealing with last night's Lost, well its unfortunate but it happens. It happened to me last summer when I was Tivo-ing Euro 2004 matches and one of my coworkers was discussing a result. It can happen in public the same way (or with the EW cover as Mhepburn20 mentioned). I generally don't let shows sit for long--I try to watch them the same day if possible--but if I do I just let my friends know I've not seen it. And if I hear a spoiler, well I'm a little disappointed to miss out on the element of surprise, but its not the end of the world.

auto

In the age of DVDs, Tivo, DVRs, etc. it was pretty stupid of Entertainment Weekly to put a huge spoiler like on the cover.

Some people, like Dalvin with 24, wait exclusively for the DVDs to come out and skip the whole season. You would think that EW would be sensitive to that. I doubt that their little spoiler sold any more copies of the magazine.

fujishig

While I see your point, what's the difference between that and putting the winner of Survivor on your cover (besides the DVD angle)? EW is a weekly magazine that wants to have the latest water-cooler talk, and I'm sure it helped some Lost fans buy it up.

DeputyDave

EVERYONE at work are huge fans of The Shield (for obvious reasons) and Wed. mornings before briefing we all geek out over the last episode. I've learned I need to watch the show Tues. night or have it ruined.

WarriorPrincess

Couldn't have said it better - especially in light of the fact that the original discourtesy the OP apparently showed his "friend" got me all irked.

You should care more about your friend's feelings than talking about a show, period.

story

*shrug* I'm wrong.

uteotw

I don't really think you're wrong.

If you Tivo something and don't watch it at its regular time,
and if you then are in a group of people talking about a show after it has aired, then either be willing to hear spoilers or leave.

For example, here we have spoilers BEFORE an episode airs but not after. Makes sense to me.

runner001

general question regarding how TIVO works. I know you have to pay for the service to use TIVO, but is this paid service including cable or is this a service separate and in addition to paying for cable?

fujishig

It's separate. Basically, it's to get the program guide so you can schedule your programs. But you still need cable, satellite, etc. to input into the box.

Certain cable companies have DVR boxes (that are NOT Tivos) that do similar things, and can be had for a modest fee over and above your normal cable bills.

TIVO doesn't seem worth the fee, but it is... it really is.

WarriorPrincess

I think the difference is in tivo users knowing they need to steer clear of group discussions when the topic switches to the show they're not caught up on, but the OP wanted to specifically discuss the show with his friend despite knowing the friend wasn't caught up with the show. I think we can expect our friends to honor our wishes not to have spoilers when they know in advance we haven't seen something. It is basic courtesy in my book. Some of us get quite busy and are not able to watch our favorite shows, or sometimes we like to do a marathon.

My dad just stayed with me for two weeks, and I had a busy week at work prior to that, so I am three weeks behind on lost/alias/eyes. After the first two eps of battlestar galactica I decided to do a marathon of the rest, so they're saved up for a sat when I have several hours open in a row. But usually I'm only a couple of days to a week behind, so my friends know to ask before talking about specifics. Why? Because I care about not having spoilers, and they care about my feelings. Seems pretty basic if you like the person.

I really don't understand resenting your friend for not wanting to hear spoilers - and if it bothers you that much to respect their wishes, maybe they aren't really as good of a friend as you think.

Jadzia

I hate it when my mom says "Did you see [Show X] last night?" and I say "no, but I have it in my Tivo to watch" and then she starts talking about it and I'm like "I haven't seen it yet, please don't spoil it for mw" and then she continues to talk about it and I have to cover my ears and say "La La La...."

So I guess I am annoyed about the same thing as the original poster, only in reverse.

story

I guess it's one of those things where I have friends that love to talk about their favorite shows (Arrested Development, Simpsons, Lost, Alias, etc.), and if I start talking about the episode, they jump down my throat because they haven't had a "convenient" time to watch the show yet. It gets irritating because eventually we just never get to talk about the show because by the time they watch it, it isn't fresh in my memory anymore, and at the same time, I'm made to feel like a jerk for watching it when it was live and trying to talk about it soon thereafter.

I guess there is a comfortable medium between the two, but this whole "watch the episode 1-2 weeks after it airs so then I can talk about it" phase is getting old.

Baron Of Hell

This is weird. You are saying Michael Jackson's brother Tivo is taping all these shows for you guys. hmmm how much he charging for this?

TheGodfather

Nothing, but mysteriously all their baby pictures are gone...

Dmacsg1

The whole point of TIVO/dvr's is so you can watch your shows on YOUR time table and not the networks.

As for me I generaly stay away from spoilers until I have watched the episodes in question.
With that said It is becoming increasingly hard to not hear what happened on "Lost", "Alias", etc ad nasium.

I also echo the comments made by an earlier poster about life getting in the way of tv watching. Just last night I finally got around to watching last weeks episode of LOST and the last two episodes of Desperate Housewives!!

Take care all!!