Apple And Android Gear To Get HBO Go

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You’ll probably remember back in January when our own Robert Nelson gave Netflix users the sad, sad news that HBO content would not be making its way to Netflix in any “meaningful” fashion until Netflix started charging more. Naturally, Netflix wasn’t terribly interested in the idea in jacking up prices when people were already considering it a viable alternative to cable television, so you didn’t see a “meaningful” amount of HBO programming. And this may be why.

An HBO video posted last week described HBO Go (which you also heard about way back last August from our own Chris Smith), in the form of a portable streaming application for HBO content. But what we only just discovered is that not only will iOS gear–iPhones, iPod Touch and iPad–will be getting HBO Go, but also Android devices will get in on this action.

HBO Go has been available since last February to Comcast and DirecTV users, and a few others besides (though strangely, not Time Warner customers, which is doubly odd as HBO is a Time Warner property), and it’s unclear as yet as to whether you’ll be able to get HBO Go over 3G connections. 3G is a little bit slow for video, but considering that HBO’s using terms like “wherever you are”, as opposed to “wherever you are as long as it has a wi-fi connection”, it’s a fair bet.

As to when you’ll be able to get in on HBO wherever you happen to be, HBO’s video suggests that May 2nd is going to be the launch date on this. Though that’s just a suggestion, so take it with the sufficient quantity of salt.

I’m all in favor of this myself, and hopefully the infrastructure will keep up to make streaming possible for just about everyone. As the content develops to match, it will be more valuable to users, and eventually, television will likely be completely overthrown for the ultimate in on-demand programming.