Back in January - Tivo CEO Michael Ramsey gave a barn-burner speech at CES. He proclaimed that tivo's allegiance to cable was over - and that the service would now move full steam ahead into IPTV. A terrific talk, and impressive given that Ramsey had almost no voice left (perhaps he had been screaming had his board?).

The project was called "Tahiti" and it was an exciting development for Tivo users and developers.
read the press release from the TIVO website here

I blogged about it then saying: " at CES, next stop was Tivo. The CEO Mike Ramsey had said this morning that he was abandoning their cable strategy and going for IPTV."

Back then ZD net quoted the one of the key Tivo exec's Howard Look saying:
"the TiVo service is much more than about DVR," said Howard Look, vice president of application and user experience at TiVo. "All the great ideas don't have to come just from us."

ZD Net: Tivo Seeks new ideas from developers

But a lot has happened since Tahiti was announced... Comcast did a deal to embrace the Tivo box as the cable/dvr solution. And given the VOD vision of Comcast's Brian Roberts, IPTV would seem to be at cross purposes.

- HOWARD HAS LEFT THE BUILDING - DID TAHITI GO WITH HIM? -

Well - seems there there are other changes afoot. While there's been no company announcement - Howard Look, a Tivo employee for the 7 years - is gone. And the rumor mill is now buzzing with suggestions that Tahiti may be postponed, adjusted, or killed. Could Tivo's shot across the bow of cable back at CES have gotten them a pair of golden handcuffs?

So who is the open source Howard Look guy: From the Tivo website: "Since joining TiVo in early 1998, Howard has led the engineering team that is responsible for developing the entire TiVo viewer interface and personal television application, including TiVo's exclusive recording management system and personalization engine. He also helped lead the production of "TiVo Takes" and "TiVolution Magazine."

Howard Look's leaving is big news for Tivo owners and potentially for IPTV as well.

Tivo was a big player - with an installed base. Media Center XP (Microsoft) is building in the IPTV space as well - but they're still in computer section of Best Buy (not the consumer TV section). Apple ? ??? No sign of a product. And Akimbo is a service that is - at this point - a closed system (though they could become IPTV i suspect with the flip of a switch).

Is the death of Tahiti the real cost of the Comcast deal for Tivo?

I don't know for a fact that it's off the boards - but I've got three independent sources that say it's being 'scaled back' considerably (though one says for technology reasons).