Want to watch Frank Budgen's skipping spot for Xbox again? Or Fallon's bouncing balls ad for Sony? In a delicious irony, the machine once hailed by doomsayers as the death of the television commercial may actually prove to be its saviour. The US manufacturer of TiVo, the on-demand personal video recorder (PVR) that allows viewers to fast forward through ads, is working with Interpublic, OMD, Starcom Mediavest Group and The Richards Group to deliver a service that will let users search for commercials. From next year, TiVo owners will be able to search for ads based on keywords or categories entered into the machine via their television. Although no pricing has been announced, it is expected that advertisers will bid for relevant keywords much as they do with internet search engines like Google. The ads will then be downloadable and can be stored for viewing at the owner's leisure. The product offers advertisers the tantalising possibility of targeting customers directly with tailored advertising. Thus, it neatly avoids traditional media placement, while offering quantifiable results on how many people are actively choosing to watch their commercials. The news comes in the same week that a report from Opera, a division of Omnicom, was released stating that by 2010 some 5 million people in the UK will own PVRs like TiVo or Sky+, and that those viewers will skip through 64 per cent of adverts. The report was generally upbeat, however, saying that the resulting lack of audience would be negated by factors including viewers who switch to digital watching more television as a whole, and watching less BBC programming. "While the medium [television] faces obvious challenges, faith in traditional, spot advertising remains largely unchecked," the report concluded. The news for the industry as a whole was equally rosy. Buoyed by next year's football World Cup in Germany, advertising expenditure is expected to bounce from 2.5 per cent this year to 4.5 per cent in 2006. [shots]