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theatlantic: 3 Very Simple Reasons Why You Can’t Get HBO Go,…

GAME OF THRONES, HBO, HBO Go, Television, TV



theatlantic:

3 Very Simple Reasons Why You Can’t Get HBO Go, Exclusively

HBO has a message for the thousands of fans begging to pay for its online streaming service, HBO Go, exclusively. Thanks, but no thanks. We don’t want your money. Even if you’ll just pirate our expensive stuff, otherwise.

Why is HBO turning away hoards of people practically begging the company to take their money … evenmore money than they currently make per subscriber right now? TV is complicated, but let’s make this simple. I’ve got three big reasons why HBO Go won’t go it alone: the price reason, the political reason, and the demographic reason.

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The Xbox 360, Now A True Cable Box Killer

Cable, Tech News, Television, TV, Xbox, Xbox 360

dm2studios:

via techcrunch.com

Microsoft just threw down at E3 2012. After exciting the crowd with Halo and Gears of War titles, the company unveiled new additions to the 360′s vast media offering. Don’t be distracted by the video game trailers: this is Redmond’s biggest news of the show. In fact the new offering could lead to a rival of the cord cutting movement.

The Xbox 360 has nearly always had an impressive suite of media streaming options with Netflix and others. For most households, though, the offering was never enough to replace cable. In fact, it was more of a supplement. But today’s announcement brings a host of new options, stations, and apps to the Xbox 360.

With these new features, the Xbox 360 has finally become Microsoft’s Trojan Horse. The target? Cable companies.

theatlantic: Primetime Mystery: Where Did All the TV Viewers…

Cable, Television, TV



theatlantic:

Primetime Mystery: Where Did All the TV Viewers Go?

Here’s the wow-quote of the day, from Jeff Gaspin, the head of entertainment at NBC, explaining to The New York Times, with remarkable clarity and certainty, that watching TV shows on-demand is more satisfying than watching them live. 

“The commercials broke the tension … I hate to say this to the AMC executives and everybody else in the business, but I will never watch ‘Walking Dead’ live again.”

Is that a gaffe? A truism? Either way, it’s right. Fewer people are watching the networks live because viewers have found better television and/or better ways to watch it. Live ratings have declined for 14 straight quarters across the networks. Meanwhile, NBC is getting regularly smacked around by ABC, CBS, and Fox. It’s barely outperformed Univision when you take out sports, according to TV by the Numbers.

But the latest news — that the networks are facing the mother of all spring swoons — is a short-term acceleration of a long-term trend. The networks’ share of primetime TV audience (dark blue in the graph below) has declined from 45% in 1985 to 25% in 2009. Basic cable ate the networks’ lunchpost-dinner audience, and now it’s technology’s turn gobble up what’s left.

Even with this long trend line (and despite the fact that viewers often unplug in the spring), there is a sense that we’ve reached a tipping point thanks to what Gaspin calls “built-up libraries.” There is more good stuff to watch not-on-live-TV than on live-TV, and even the head of entertainment at NBC knows it.

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imwithkanye: Aaron Sorkin on His New HBO Show, The Newsroom,…

Aaron Sorkin, Broadway, jeff daniels, Musical Dialogue, Script, Television, The Newsroom, TV, Vanity Fair, writing



imwithkanye:

Aaron Sorkin on His New HBO Show, The Newsroom, and His Style of “Musical Dialogue” | Vanity Fair

The trick with Aaron, which I think makes this the ultimate challenge is that you have to learn a Broadway play every week. We’re not walking around the corner holding a gun, going, ‘Look out!’ We’re coming around the corner and doing Sorkin, and that’s a whole other thing. And it’s Sorkin at 90 miles an hour, because there’s a musicality, there’s a rhythm to him. Dialogue that has to come out of your mouth, snap-snap—and not just actors talking fast. These [characters] are very smart people, they think fast and they talk fast, and those listening have to keep up.

—Jeff Daniels on Aaron Sorkin. (Also check out Sorkin On Set.)