End of an Era: No more TiVo

I have a question for all of you:  In the era of streaming services, is anyone still using a TiVo to record live TV?  If so, keep reading.

TiVo, the set-top box device that was, for a time, synonymous with recording live TV for later playback in the same way Google was and still is synonymous with Internet searches, has been discontinued.

For those too young to understand what I'm talking about, let me set the scene.

It was 1999.  Everyone was freaking out about the new millennium and Y2K.  Most people still had dial-up Internet.  Streaming services didn't exist yet, not even as an idea.  If you wanted to watch a show, you had to either watch it live or record it on a VCR.  DVDs were still a "new" technology, and wouldn't overtake VCRs and VHS for a few years.

Then, along came TiVo.  A device that could record live TV and store it on a hard drive as opposed to magnetic tape cassettes.  It could set up recordings with a simple button press, as opposed to the often headache-inducing VCR setup, where each recording had to be scheduled and set up individually, and you had better hope everything worked and what you wanted to watch didn't get delayed by other programming.  It was more than a little annoying at times.

What happened?

Eventually, TV providers, whether cable or satellite, got into the DVR game themselves, offering their own devices.

Also, the rise of streaming services and the downward trend in people watching live TV, be it over-the-air antenna, cable or satellite, have done a number on the amount of people using a TiVo.

What happens now?

TiVo has discontinued the physical box units, and they're shifting to smart TVs, trying to compete with Amazon and Roku.  If you still have a TiVo unit, they will reportedly continue to work... for now.  There are conflicting reports on just what will happen, but eventually, they'll stop working, either because the units themselves will break down or TiVo will just pull the plug on the infrastructure that makes them work.