HBO To Offer Online Streaming Without TV Subscription

An anonymous reader writes By now, everyone not living in total isolation knows that HBO has announced plans to offer content streaming in 2015 with no TV subscription requirements. Many wonder what took HBO so long to make this transition. Some speculate that the growing unpopularity of ISP giants has shifted bargaining power in HBO's favor. Others say that it's purely maths; there are more cord-cutters and more people willing to shell out money for specific content, as evidenced by Netflix surpassing HBO in earnings this year "despite Netflix having a smaller customer base". Whatever the reason, all are expecting this development to induce "more content providers to make their shows more readily available online".

Comments

Re:I am not alone when I say....

[Kjella]

IF they will give me episodes...
1) On their TV release date.
2) Of quality at least as good as cable feeds
3) In a usable non-DRM container which doesn't require a web browser
4) Charge no more than $5 per episode (even that is steep).

If it's anything like HBO Nordic:
1) Within 24 hours, often <6 hours
2) Less bandwidth than H.264 cable rips, no 5.1 sound but also not terrible
3) When hell freezes over
4) Here in Norway it's 79 NOK/month, subtracting VAT = $115/year for access to all HBO series

I'm a subscriber but still prefer downloading due to 2), then again I think HBO Nordic is their own company that bought to rights from HBO centrally so whether or not any of this applies is uncertain. I think the delay is because they don't get access to the episode until it's aired in the US, for example.