In HBO’s earnings call this week, HBO CEO Richard Plepler noted, among other things, that HBO hasn’t seen any evidence whatsoever that the network’s streaming service, HBO Now, is cutting into their cable subscription service. He said, according to VideoNuze, that they were “seeing absolutely no intrusion into people inside the (pay-TV) ecosystem, none at all; it’s all additive.” The HBO Now service is basically targeted at only the 10-15 million homes with broadband access only.
Unfortunately for HBO, the new streaming service hasn’t prevented record-breaking piracy of Game of Thrones, which must mean that many who claim that a stand-alone service was the only thing preventing them from illegally downloading Game of Thrones were simply lying. (HBO has not yet provided details on the number of new HBO Now subscribers, however).
The interesting note here, however, is how Plepler casually suggested that there are “no barriers” to including non-HBO content on HBO Now.
That may not sound like much, but what it means is that HBO Now is free to include content from, say, its corporate partners, Turner and Warner Bros. There’s also the possibility that they might license even more content outside of its sibling partnerships, as well. In fact, HBO Nordic is already licensing programs from Showtime, Starz, AMC, and NBCU.
What does that mean? Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. Right now, you can get HBO and Showtime streaming. You can get much of Comedy Central’s offerings on Hulu. What’s keeping me from cutting the cord is the inability to get FX and AMC. While many of their programs are already on Netflix or Amazon, if HBO can get in on that action, too, it can truly compete against Netflix in the streaming-only sector.
All else being equal at that point, for those who have to decide between HBO or Netflix, it might basically come down to who offers the best original content? Orange Is the New Black or Game of Thrones? House of Cards or Veep? Daredevil or True Detective?
Those are decisions I would never want to have to make.
Source: VideoNuze
