Spotted on NewTeeVee.

Official press release can be found here.

TiVo Offers Subscribers More Ways to Discover Relevant and Personalized Content Directly from the TiVo Remote

ALVISO, Calif., July 17, 2008 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network/ — TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO), the creator of and a leader in television services for digital video recorders (DVRs), today announced the availability of YouTube videos on the TV via a TiVo(R) DVR. A partnership between the two companies allows broadband-connected subscribers with TiVo Series3(TM) and TiVo HD DVRs, to access hundreds of millions of user generated videos hosted on YouTube. Whether you like to watch the new up-n-comers, or classic YouTube favorites, TiVo subscribers are in control of the content they want to watch, whenever they want to watch it.

“With YouTube content now available on TiVo, on top of all the movies, music videos, songs and TV shows that are simply unavailable on cable and satellite, TiVo subscribers have more choice on their TV sets than any other TV viewers in the world,” said Tom Rogers, President and CEO of TiVo Inc.

YouTube on the Web attracts millions of viewers a day, and now TiVo offers consumers the opportunity to experience YouTube content where it is more comfortably consumed — in front of the TV set. TiVo users can now search, browse and watch their favorite YouTube videos through TiVo’s famously easy-to-use interface. Soon, users will also be able to log into their YouTube accounts directly through the TV to access their videos, channels and playlists, making the experience even richer.

“YouTube brings video where the audience is — across the Web and onto mobile devices, TVs and video games,” said Hunter Walk, YouTube’s director of product management. “The partnership with TiVo extends our ability to make YouTube accessible anywhere and lets people watch what they want, when they want it.”

Over the next few weeks TiVo will roll-out a software upgrade to Series3 and TiVo HD DVRs which will enable this feature. For more information on how to view YouTube videos on the TV via a TiVo DVR visit http://www.tivo.com/youtube.

Back in March I blogged about TiVo’s plan to offer YouTube content on your Series 3 and TiVo HD DVRs.   Well, as I had expected, the 9.4 software upgrade will include YouTube support.  My blogging buddy Dave Zatz was lucky enough to get his hands on the 9.4 upgrade and he has produced the following video (embedded below) showcasing the new functionality.  Another cool thing about this upgrade is that the YouTube content will be H.264 encoded which means that the upgrade will enable H.264 on the Series 3 and TiVo HDs!

If you want more information you should head on over to TiVo’s press release as well as on TiVo’s website.  For now all you can do is sit back and wait for your DVR to get the upgrade.  I would expect that TiVo will update their priority page sometime in the near future.  When they do I’ll be sure to mention it on this site.