海角大神

It鈥檚 becoming the Internet-age equivalent of the 鈥淢*A*S*H鈥� finale toilet flush 鈥� shutting down HBO GO.

Live TV ratings aren鈥檛 in yet, but last night鈥檚 long-awaited Season 4 premi猫re of 鈥淕ame of Thrones鈥� was a successful one: so successful, in fact that fans logging in to reunite with the Starks, Lannisters, and the rest of the citizens of Westeros overwhelmed HBO鈥檚 on-demand streaming provider, HBO GO.聽 Many were met with interminable loading times and the message, 鈥淔atal error: Failed to load the service definitions.鈥�

鈥淟ooks like there鈥檚 trouble in the realm,鈥� tweeted HBO GO鈥檚 official Twitter account, in response. 鈥淎pologies for the inconvenience. We鈥檒l be providing updates, so please stay tuned.鈥�

鈥淗aving trouble accessing @HBO GO? Send a raven,鈥� read a later tweet. @GameOfThrones will be available soon on HBO On Demand with some cable providers.鈥�

Users on Reddit and Twitter weren鈥檛 so amused, and the network issued a more formal apology later in the evening:

鈥淗BO GO did experience issues due to overwhelming demand around the premiere of 鈥楪ame of Thrones.鈥� HBO later said in a press statement. 鈥淭he service has returned to several platforms and we are working hard towards full recovery, which we expect soon."

The 鈥淕ames of Thrones鈥� premi猫re聽is the second crash in a month for HBO GO: The finale for 鈥淭rue Detective,鈥� the crime drama starring Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson, also flooded the service, with many users shut out or watching a load screen for hours. Afterward, Time Warner chief executive Jeff Bewkes promised investors that his company would invest more in HBO GO to prevent such a thing from happening again.

But in all likelihood,聽 鈥淕ame of Thrones鈥� and 鈥淭rue Detective鈥� fans affected by the HBO GO outages weren鈥檛 entirely made up of paying HBO subscribers. It鈥檚 common, if not yet quantifiable knowledge that many people watch HBO GO content using login information and passwords given to them by a friend or relative. It was frequently remarked upon last night by Twitter users, including @WalterHickey, who tweeted, 鈥淗ey, come on HBO GO, one of my roommate鈥檚 parents [grandparents?] are paying good money for this.鈥�

鈥淕ame of Thrones," too, has already proven popular with those on the other side of the HBO paywall. Last year鈥檚 Season 3 finale became the most-shared illegal download in history, according to numbers from the file-sharing and copyright news website TorrentFreak.聽 Season 4鈥檚 premi猫re has already broken that record, racking up over a million illegal shares in less than half a day.聽The response even prompted London police to crack down聽on illegal download sites in anticipation of the premi猫re.

HBO GO password shares don鈥檛 technically count as pirating, but HBO is well aware if the problem. One tweet from the company, in fact, seemed particularly pointed: 鈥淲e're sorry for all of the trouble, but if you're an @HBO subscriber, the @GameOfThrones premiere replays at 11 PM EST.鈥�

Still, the network isn鈥檛 especially concerned that so many people are watching 鈥淕ame of Thrones鈥� for聽 free, likely because it increases its fan base and cultural footprint. Last year, HBO president of programming Michael Lombardo told Entertainment Weekly that the rampant downloads were 鈥渁 compliment of sorts.鈥� While saying that HBO has a firm antipiracy policy, he noted that his biggest concern was that pirated copies would be of poorer quality than the original show.

HBO has said in the past that it was considering offering HBO GO as a separate product for noncable subscribers, which could reduce the number of illegal downloads, not to mention password borrowers.聽

UPDATE: The 9 p.m. broadcast of the Season 4 debut drew 6.6 million viewers, a record for "Game of Thrones and the highest viewership for HBO since 'The Sopranos' series finale in 2007.聽