In what way is this story of interest to people in the UK, or for that matter to anyone in the world other than the USA?

Yeah, great, and back in the UK we're stuck with going to the video shop, ordering off the internet and waiting for it to be delivered, buying a dodgy DVD, or downloading illegally.

Come back to me when this launches in the UK.

The better to track what you buy and how often you watch it.

I love my UK TiVo series 1 but I think I'd have almost indecent amounts of love for one of the newer models.

Is no UK media provider interested in licencing TiVo for their own set-top boxes? Sky is out - partly because it did such a crappy job on marketing the original box, but also because it wants to flog its (in many ways inferior) Sky+ box; but surely the likes of Branson need something to distinguish their own offerings.