Are you an HBO customer or do you, like me, use a buddy’s log in to watch your shows because you don’t have cable? Well that’s about to change. HBO just announced that sometime next year they will launch a web-only service! That means you can get HBO without a cable subscription. About time!
HBO CEO Richard Pleper said
“It is time to remove all barriers to those who want HBO. So, in 2015, we will launch a stand-alone, over-the-top, HBO service in the United States…there are 80 million homes that do not have HBO and we will use all means at our disposal to go after them.”
Pricing is unclear at this point but looking at other services like HULU and Netlfix it’s safe to assume, and hope for, around $10 a month. This, I hope, will be a turning point for a lot of other premium channels. I have a cable subscription and could count the number of extra channels I watch on one hand. If other networks take note and follow suit I might not need my cable anymore or at the very least my price will come down.
We also don’t know if multiple users can watch shows at the same time with the same logins. I wouldn’t be surprised if they followed Netflix’s business model on this, which is where users can pay more each month for multiple devices working simultaneously. Even with these unanswered questions cable-free HBO is something I will be signing up for the day it’s available.