“Time Warner Inc’s partnership and release timing seems to have paid off,” Louis Bedigian reports for Benzinga.
“The entertainment conglomerate teamed up with Apple Inc. to promote the launch of HBO Now, an online-only streaming video service. Time Warner also made sure that the service arrived in time for the April 12 premiere of Game of Thrones,” Bedigian reports. “‘It’s a super-successful launch,’ Dan Sahar, co-founder and VP of Product Marketing at Qwilt, told Benzinga. Qwilt sells devices to network operators. Those devices sit inside of the operator, which allows Qwilt to see what consumers watch.”
“On Sunday, April 12, HBO Now jumped to No. 7 on Qwilt’s ranking of major video sites,” Bedigian reports. “Note that HBO Go, the online companion for traditional HBO subscriptions, landed in the top five.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: This seems like it might bode well for Apple’s rumored over-the-top TV service, but, keep in mind: HBO Now launched with a 30-day free trial and the best it could do 7th place. Let’s see where it goes from here.
Related articles:
How Apple’s Jimmy Iovine helped land HBO Now – April 7, 2015
‘HBO Now’ is now available to Apple device users; 30-day free trial offered – April 7, 2015
HBO Now standalone service exclusive for Apple devices until summer – March 10, 2015
HBO NOW premiers in April for iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and Apple TV – March 9, 2015
I fully expected it to be a nightmare but after two episodes it hasn’t lagged once and the picture looks as good as Blu-ray.
Nice work by all involved.
What are you talking about, you can buy HBO content with a click of the button on iTunes – I own every HBO series I watch – Sopranos, Wire, Girls, Togetherness, Boardwalk Empire, etc.
I have been buying their series for years too. But with HBO for $15/month I am already watching a lot more of their content such as Bill Maher, John Oliver, and other series and movies that I wouldn’t have purchased before.
I cut cable in 2007 and waited 12 years for this! 🙂
When I can buy HBO content at the click of a button via Apple TV- call me. Till then, I’ll keep my DVR.
Trolls do not own Apple devices.
@DavGreg
What’s a DVR?
Anyhooo…I’ve been using HBONow since day 1 and I’m impressed.
As AAPLer noted, the picture quality is fantastic and I can finally watch Bill Maher, GOT, last week tonight, and Silicon Valley…on my iPhone…or iPad…anywhere. Who needs that DV thingy you mentioned.
While I suspect you’re being facetious a DVR, such as EyeTV 3 software for the Mac, is great for recording all the free content that’s available via antenna. If you haven’t looked, you’ll be surprised at what you can get – via antenna I can receive 118 channels here in Houston.
I supplement OTA programming with Amazon Prime and à la cart series purchased from iTunes. My cumulative savings since dropping DirecTV back in January of 2013 is $3322 (what I used to pay DirecTV less what I’ve paid for à la cart content).
More info in my blog.
http://atariage.com/forums/blog/blog-148/cat-150-dvr-project
I forgot to mention…I HATE commercials and I don’t watch network TV.
Commercials. Must. Die.
I’m also hate to tinker with stuff.
Really. Hate. Tinkering.
Yes I experimented with http://tvshowsapp.com but you usually end up with crap video with sound sync problems. Plus it uses Torrent files.
Hate. Those. Torrent. Files.
Then there’s the ‘external link’ sites like couchtuner, but these are really formatted for the desktop as they are typically flash based with tons of java script redirects. Sending these streams to AppleTV is just a horrible experience. Horrible. Mobile…fugetaboutit.
I will gladly pay for:
1. Great user experience
2. Excellent Video and Audio quality
3. No commercials
4. Mobile remediation
With Netflix, AppleTV, and now HBONow I get to: (a) watch great programming, (b) with excellent video/audio quality, (c) with NO commercials, (d) on any device.
Did I mention network TV sucks yak nads?
I remember when most of the cable channels didn’t have commercials, that was really nice. Now a days I purchase shows like “The Walking Dead” à la cart via iTunes and do enjoy the lack of commercials vs when I watched them on DirecTV.
However, for the network shows that I do enjoy, I’ll gladly trade hitting “skip ahead 30” a few times while watching the show vs spending $40 or so for the season. I’ve also noticed that the picture quality of broadcast TV tends to be better than streaming, iTunes or cable/DirecTV.
As far as tinkering, yeah there are some quirks and if you don’t care to deal with that then no, it’s not the solution for you. My folks are looking to cut the cord now that dad’s retiring and we’re investigating the Tablo for them as I don’t think mom would care for using a setup like my Mac mini running EyeTV3. Tablo didn’t exist yet when I cut the cord, else I might have gone with it myself as it’s pretty slick. It sits on your network and will send content to any TV or portable device you care for. The TVs need to use something like a Roku 3, the portable devices have apps.
https://www.tablotv.com
Hadn’t heard of TVShows2 before – it looks like it’s full of pirated content though, so I’ll pass.
Recording? What and why is that? Do you have great Mac software for recording and managing your Youtube videos and Netflix shows too? LOL.
Its nutty how backwards much of TV still is.
While that’s a false comparison, I actually do have a way to record (download) Youtube videos.
http://www.verticalforest.com/youtube5-extension/
I transfer the stuff off of the DVR with EyeTV HD- now discontinued by ElGato in the U.S.- and have a full 1080 HD copy for my iTunes library. Can’t do that with HBO Now.
Had the first AppleTV and it’s loaded with purchased and downloaded content…which I have never accessed after watching the shows the first time.
Besides, I can watch them via iCloud.
99.999999999% of TV is forgettable and couldn’t imagine watching even popular shows multiple times. Like Lost…why oh why would you watch that series twice.
Actually purchased the fifth season via iTunes store Germany, Downloaded the first episode then they removed it. now back to p2p; just stupid! I paid, and still can’t get it legally………..