TiVo, the pioneer of digital video recording devices (DVR), is reportedly testing a new feature during tonight’s finally of NBC’s The Voice.¹ The feature makes perfect sense, so much so that it is hard to believe that this sort of experiment has not taken place yet.

The Voice, as you are no doubt aware, is a reality TV singing competition. In the finale of the show, tonight, viewers decide on and vote for the winner. NBC provides a more detailed description of the finale:

In the final live performance phase of the competition, the top artists from each team will compete each week against each other during a live broadcast. The television audience will vote to save their favorite artists, and the two artists with the lowest number of votes will be sent home each week. In the end, one will be named “The Voice” and will receive the grand prize of a recording contract. ²

Until now, this view voting was done in one of four way: calling a toll-free number; voting on The Voice website; voting via text message; through downloading performances on iTunes.³ However, TiVo wants to add a fifth voting method.

The TiVo remote includes both a thumbs up and a thumbs down button. These buttons, until now, are used in the “TiVo Suggestions,” feature. By voting thumbs up or thumbs down, TiVo recommends various programs that align with your ratings.⁴ However, Dave Zatz is reporting that TiVo is making a trial run of using these buttons as a voting mechanism on tonight’s The Voice finale ⁵ According to Zatz, some TiVo customers have received the following email:

If you’re interested in helping out, here’s what to do:

• Watch The Voice episode “Live Final Performances,” airing Monday, 12/16 at 8 PM/7 Central.
• As you watch the episode, please use the Thumbs Up and Thumbs Down buttons on your TiVo remote throughout the episode to rate the contestants’ performances.
• Really loving it? Press Thumbs Up! Totally hate it? Press Thumbs Down!
• You can use the Thumbs buttons as many times as you want throughout the episode.
• You can use the Thumbs buttons more than once on the same performance.
• Feel free to fast-forward, pause, and rewind as usual.

You don’t have to watch the episode live as it airs, but if possible, please try to watch the episode on Monday night. Sound interesting? Just watch and click — that’s all you have to do. There’s no online survey, just “vote with your remote.”⁶

Perhaps it is owing to TiVo’s small size of the DVR market share, but it is hard to believe that this sort of voting functionality has not been tested yet. It stands to reason that the ease of this form of voting – requiring almost no extra effort on the viewers part at all – will draw an incredible amount of votes.