Zatz Not Funny!
All your digital media goodness.
I don’t take many vacations, but every now and then I like to get out of town for a little bit of gambling. Each time I hit Vegas, Reno or Tahoe, I usually stay at a different casino – So, I never really know what to expect. Some of the hotels that I’ve stayed at have been great and some have been terrible, but Circus Circus is the first that has lost my business forever.
Normally I’d be bothered by a dirty room or poor customer service but, in this case, it was a big fat sticker prohibiting guests from connecting their own AV gear to the television sets. Five years ago, I wouldn’t have cared but, with the explosion in the number of laptop to TV solutions and video cameras with outputs, this has become an important issue for consumers to consider. What good does it do you to be able to take your PC or camera on the go, if hotels end up freezing you out by neutering their TVs?
I realize the hotel pay-per-video business is lucrative, but tech savvy consumers are also a juicy demographic worth courting. In the past, hotels haven’t really competed against outside video sources but, as technology has improved, we’ve seen new possibilities emerge. Instead of leaving your TV at home, you can placeshift it using Sling or Orb. And with the proliferation of portable DVD players, it’s easy to take movies on the go. Whether it’s the newly announced Sansa TakeTV or the upcoming SlingCatcher, we’re seeing a rapid increase in the number of solutions for moving digital video to the television. Right now, this will primarily be an issue for early adopters, but as PC to TV technology goes mainstream it’ll be something that more people will want to think about.
In my dream world, casinos would charge $20 more per night and I’d get unlimited broadband, along with a TiVo that can record content during my stay. But I’m not holding my breath. I realize the casinos would rather have me gambling rather than watching TV, but being able to placeshift local sports makes betting on them that much more exciting. So while some hotels may try to lock people into their proprietary systems, I’m going to insist on free WiFi and open television wherever I book – even if it means that I’m staying at motels, instead of clowning around with Circus Circus.
Davis Freeberg is a technology enthusiast living in the Bay Area. He enjoys writing about movies, music, and the impact that digital technology is having on traditional media. Read more at Davis Freeberg’s Digital Connection. Davis is a TiVo shareholder.
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10 Responses for "Circus Circus Clowns Around With TV"
Damn! I’ve got Circus Circus as my back-up reservation for CES in January. Ah well. Heaven knows I won’t end up spending much time in my hotel room anyway…
Never much cared for Circus Circus. Not only for all the reasons you mentioned but also that sticker is TACKY.
Well, at least they had the sense to use Comic Sans!
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What an odd restriction. Did you try the a/v jack anyway?
When I went out of town for a friend’s wedding, I hauled my original xbox. The Holiday Inn Express we stayed in had a free a/v jack on the TV, and an ethernet port in proximity to it, so I was actually able to get some game on that weekend.
I was positively thrilled by the new Plug Into Marriott setup at the San Francisco Marriott when I visited in June for the Apple Worldwide Developer Conference. They have hot flat-panel HDTVs in the rooms, with a variety of hookups for your own portable DVD player, MP3 player, or laptop. This is where hotels have to be heading! I know Marriott is rolling these out at lots of other full-service properties. Keep an eye out.
@Razor – I tried to get to the a/v jack, but they’ve actually taken apart the back of the TV and have it directly connected into their PPV system. To make matters worse, they actually bolted the TV down, so that you have to be pretty motivated, to even to find the a/v jacks. When I complained to the hotel management about neutering the TV, they told me that I clearly didn’t understand the hotel business and was pretty much blown off. I think the manager was wrong, I understand the business, I just don’t think it’s a good policy to freeze out third party devices. By myself, it probably wasn’t worth dealing with me, but in the future I’m going to look for Holiday Inns and Marriott hotels of the world, even if I don’t plan on placeshifting any content.
I can’t count how many of those little black connection blockers I’ve broken off of cable connections. And never actually had them say anything to me. Housekeeping just doesn’t care about that stuff.. You can actually buy the tool anyway. I used to carry a Tivo around when I lived out of hotels for work and discovered most PPV systems send the movies out on a channel that the TV won’t tune to but the Tivo will. You can surf channels and watch other people going through the purchase process and then watch their movie..
Little black connection blockers and a tool to break them off? Can you be more specific? Where can I get this tool?
Seems like there should be the equivalent of the FM Radio Transmitter for MP3 players… i.e. a way to get the signal in to a TV that is locked down. Cut the cable and splice a transmitter into it? Leave the M-M connector behind each time? Just clamp on a transmitter that cuts through the sheathing with teeth?
Or just bring a laptop and watch what you want on your laptop, using a SlingBox at home…
I usually go the laptop+Slingbox route. On Monday night I watched last weeks Journeyman episode and last night I watched the current episode, both from my TiVo Series3. Wish I also had more Dexter DVDs with me – great series!
By the way, I’m in a Courtyard by Marriott this week and the Philips tube is also locked down with the (OnCommand) black box.
I heard if you’ve spent the night in a Holiday Inn Express they’ll let you hook up anything you want in the morning.
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