cable

Oct 15, 2014 ∞

HBO without cable coming in 2015

Peter Kafka reports at Recode:

[HBO CEO Richard] Plepler said the company will go “beyond the wall” and launch a “stand alone, over the top” version of HBO in the US next year, and would work with “current partners,” and may work with others as well. But he wouldn’t provide any other detail.

Plepler has been pondering this possibility for a while, and a couple of years ago I did some back-of-the-napkin math which suggested there is a lot of money to be had in a web-only subscription.

I’m not known for my math skills, but it looks like I was on to something.

Correction: This post has been updated because I originally stated the year HBO plans to launch its web-only offering as 2014 in the link at the top, instead of 2015, which is the correct year. Sorry folks.

Mar 22, 2013 ∞

HBO CEO wants to bundle HBO GO with your internet subscription

This is progress, although MG Siegler is right to doubt whether cable companies, many of whom are also internet service providers, would even consider such a deal.

At least HBO recognizes that the math won’t hold up against a la carte models forever.

Sep 12, 2012 ∞

"The Math"

“The Math”

Once again, MG Siegler nails it on HBO’s missed opportunity for direct-subscription innovation.

Most companies are so desperate to maintain anything close to an upward slant in revenue year-over-year that they never even know opportunities like this one exist.

The worst part of this situation, to me, is the fact that HBO is being repeatedly told about this opportunity and actively ignoring it merely because it doesn’t make short-term business sense.

Jun 12, 2012 ∞

Pirates of Westeros: the untapped half-billion dollar market for Game of Thrones

Ernesto at TorrentFreak:

It’s clear that HBO (and others) prefer exclusiveness over piracy, which is a dangerous game. They might make decent money in the long run by selling subscriptions. However, this limited availability also breeds pirates, and one has to wonder how easy it is to convert these people to subscriptions once they have experienced BitTorrent.

TorrentFreak is unabashedly pro-torrent and, some might argue, pro-piracy if necessary. And they don’t exactly divulge great detail on their methodology for determining downloads and viewership. But, let’s assume for the sake of a blog post that their numbers are accurate.

Game of Thrones pulled an estimated 4.2 million legitimate (read: cable-subscribed) viewers per episode and 3.9 million illegal torrent downloads per episode during its second season. You could even, as Gizmodo's Casey Chan did, pull legitimate viewership numbers from Wikipedia and use those alongside TorrentFreak’s download numbers to come ot the conclusion that more people pirated the second season than legally watched it. I don’t think you need to massage the numbers, though:

Hulu will eventually require a cable subscription

Our source noted that Hulu has no interest in being a first mover here and that a requirement for authentication is likely still a few years out. Hulu, however, does want to be a good partner and may have to give in to its partners’ pressure soon or later.

via techcrunch.com

This is a damn shame. It’ll be a blow to the common-sense evolution of television as a business model, and a boon to piracy.