'Game of Thrones' Season 5 is here. Time to spring for HBO Now?
Just in time for Season 5 of 鈥淕ame of Thrones,鈥� HBO Now聽, offering, for the first time, the chance for customers to legally access the network without a cable subscription.
The stand-alone Web streaming service was released Tuesday for Apple TV and Cablevision鈥檚 Optimum Online service. It is also available via devices that use Apple鈥檚 iOS operating system, such as iPhones and iPads.
聽is available for a monthly subscription of $14.99. Customers who sign up now get a 30-day trial for free.
According to the company, HBO Now offers more than 2,000 titles for immediate viewing, including current series like 鈥淕ame of Thrones,鈥� which returns for its fifth season April 12, and previous series like 鈥淒eadwood,鈥� 鈥淭he Sopranos鈥� and 鈥淭he Wire.鈥�
HBO Now will be similar to HBO Go, the mobile and Web streaming app already available to HBO cable subscribers.
The release of the stand-alone app is a departure for the network, which built its market share on movies but, over the past decade or so, has become just as well known for original programming unfettered by FCC regulations on things like profanity and nudity.
Since its debut, fantasy epic 鈥淕ame of Thrones鈥� has聽the most illegally downloaded show on television. In many online forums, fans have expressed their willingness to pay for episodes of the show, if they could do so without a cable subscription.
That鈥檚 a reality that networks and cable providers are being forced to embrace, as a small but growing segment of Web users have begun to rely聽on streaming devices like the Roku or Google鈥檚 Chromecast, along with products like Hulu, Netflix and Amazon.
聽in February, offering a bundle of channels including ESPN, CNN and AMC for a monthly fee.
Apple is reported to be working on聽, which could debut as early as this fall, and other networks,聽, have released their own stand-alone streaming apps.
