re: Game of Thrones' Director Claims Illegal Downloads Don't Matter

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It seems that the only funding cable companies would give HBO is in the form of subscriber fees. I could be very wrong, however.

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But they already have an established subscriber base through the cable companies. You have no guarantee that current HBO subscribers would automatically become HBOGO subscribers. Moving from a reseller model to a direct to consumer model is a big risk. That'd be like Samsung saying "people really like our TVs, let's cut the price but only sell them on Samsung.com" They'd be nuts to go that route. Yeah it might work out, but the risk of it failing is just too great.

IMO what is going to happen is that in another decade or so Roku/Apple/Microsoft/Sony/Google/Amazon will replace the cable companies as the middle man. You'll have an account with whoever manufactures your streaming device and they'll sell you access to NetFlix, HuluPlus, HBOGO, etc. I just don't see the average consumer signing up for every streaming service individually.