Game of Thrones premiere sets piracy record

[pcslookout]

http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/02/technology/game-of-thrones-piracy/

HBO's mythical drama "Game of Thrones" set a record for modern-day piracy after its Sunday night premiere, as viewers around the globe scrambled to watch the season 3 debut episode that aired on the premium cable network.

Piracy tracker TorrentFreak says that more than 1 million viewers downloaded the episode in the first day after it aired. At one point, more than 163,000 people were simultaneously sharing a single torrent -- a new record. The previous record, of just under 145,000 simultaneously file-swappers, was set by the "Heroes" season 3 debut in 2008, according to TorrentFreak's data.

The heavy demand for the premiere episode is no surprise, given that TorrentFreak says "Game of Thrones" was the most pirated show of 2012. According to its estimate, 4.3 million people downloaded the season finale last year, nearly a half-million more than downloaded the second-most pirated show, the Showtime drama "Dexter."

TorrentFreak did not have an estimate for the total number of people who have downloaded this year's premiere so far. London is the city with the most illegal downloads of the episode, it said, while the country with the heaviest downloads was the United States, followed by the U.K. and Australia.

Those downloading the file were using BitTorrent, a free software system that lets users swap large media files. It is widely used to illegally trade movies and other copyrighted content. Hollywood is concerned about illegal downloads, but HBO programming president Michael Lombardo told Entertainment Weekly recently that the network sees the piracy of "Game of Thrones" as a sign of success more than a problem.

"I probably shouldn't be saying this, but it is a compliment of sorts," Lombardo said ahead of the season 3 premier. "The demand is there. And it certainly didn't negatively impact the DVD sales. [Piracy is] something that comes along with having a wildly successful show on a subscription network."

It's HBO policy to fight piracy of its shows, particularly when it finds people illegally selling episodes of its shows, but the network isn't going after individual viewers, Lombardo said: "We haven't sent out the Game of Thrones police."

HBO, Entertainment Weekly and CNNMoney are all units of Time Warner (TWX, Fortune 500).

In a recent interview with CNN's Jake Tapper, "Game of Thrones" co-creator David Benioff speculated about all the special effects he could buy if those who illegally pirated the show were paying 99 cents or so per download.

"You do kind of think, God, if we just had a little bit of that, we could have had that extra scene with the dragons," he said.

The Dragon post is a lie.

 

[Vdubchaos]

Can someone post a link to Season 1 and 2 streams (no torrents please)?

Thx

:biggrin:

 

[pcslookout]

Can someone post a link to Season 1 and 2 streams (no torrents please)?

Thx

:biggrin:

No way. You need to do the hard work yourself.

 

[Juddog]

Can someone post a link to Season 1 and 2 streams (no torrents please)?

Thx

:biggrin:

Just buy the blu-ray on amazon, it was on sale last time I checked.

 

[pcslookout]

Just buy the blu-ray on amazon, it was on sale last time I checked.

That or get HBO Go.

Though I never use mine.

 

[Vdubchaos]

Meh, I will wait until it's or netflix. Never cared to even search the web for it...but I'm sure it's out there.

I don't care for it enough to pay to watch it. : D

 

[Rakehellion]

I'm not much of a TV watcher, but I'm sure the networks are as anti-Comcast as the consumers.

 

[bearxor]

Meh, I will wait until it's or netflix. Never cared to even search the web for it...but I'm sure it's out there.

I don't care for it enough to pay to watch it. : D

It will not be on Netflix

 

[Gibsons]

http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/02/technology/game-of-thrones-piracy/



The Dragon post is a lie.

He's probably really thinking "I could buy that second yacht."

 

[mmntech]

It will not be on Netflix

Why make it convenient for people to watch? That's too smart.

 

[Red Storm]

That or get HBO Go.

Though I never use mine.

Unfortunately to get HBO Go you have to get HBO... which means you have to get cable.

 

[Baked]

Sharing is caring. It's more than you can say for all the wall street assholes who use charity as an excuse to cheat taxes.

 

[AstroManLuca]

That or get HBO Go.

Though I never use mine.

Which you can only get if you already have HBO, which you can only get if you already have a $60+ monthly TV service.

I wonder how long it'll take companies to figure out that people are willing to pay a la carte for quality programming. If they put the episodes up for sale at a couple bucks apiece (maybe an extra $1 for HD), they'd make tons of money and piracy would go way down.

Then again, they might also lose some cable subscribers.

But as long as you're looking at $1,000+ a year to legitimately watch a 10-episode TV series when it comes out, there are a lot of people who would never even consider subscribing in the first place.

The music industry has learned this. So has the video game industry. But from where I'm sitting, the best two ways to watch movies are Netflix ($10 a month for all the shitty movies I can stomach) and Redbox ($1.30 for fairly recent releases). It just seems ridiculous that the best way to watch reasonably new releases is to walk over to a vending machine that dispenses physical media.

 

[Brainonska511]

Can someone post a link to Season 1 and 2 streams (no torrents please)?

Thx

:biggrin:

Season 1
Season 2

 

[lokiju]

I WANT to legally pay for a streaming only option of HBO but cannot without having cable and a HBO subscription. Since I've "cut the cord", there's no way in hell I'm going to take on the expense of basic cable just so I can then add HBO to then have the access.

Please HBO, wake up and make this an option already!

 

[Jimzz]

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones

can't believe this was not posted yet.

 

[CZroe]

I downloaded them and handbraked them to all my devices...

...from the legal digital copy and BD/DVD box sets.

Discs were cheap and worth it. I have a Usenet account but I didn't use it. Sharing my Handbraked copies is akin to loaning the discs as far as I am concerned.

 

[mmntech]

Which you can only get if you already have HBO, which you can only get if you already have a $60+ monthly TV service.

I wonder how long it'll take companies to figure out that people are willing to pay a la carte for quality programming. If they put the episodes up for sale at a couple bucks apiece (maybe an extra $1 for HD), they'd make tons of money and piracy would go way down.

Then again, they might also lose some cable subscribers.

But as long as you're looking at $1,000+ a year to legitimately watch a 10-episode TV series when it comes out, there are a lot of people who would never even consider subscribing in the first place.

The music industry has learned this. So has the video game industry. But from where I'm sitting, the best two ways to watch movies are Netflix ($10 a month for all the shitty movies I can stomach) and Redbox ($1.30 for fairly recent releases). It just seems ridiculous that the best way to watch reasonably new releases is to walk over to a vending machine that dispenses physical media.

It's worse here in Canada where streaming services are either nonexistant or considerably subpar compared to their American versions. This is entirely due to region locking thanks to an archaic content licensing system.

Conventional broadcast TV is dying, much like a decade ago when conventional music distribution was dying. Instead of innovating, the music industry actively resisted digital download technology. It took four years for a legal alternative to appear. When they did launch iTunes, it was low bit rate and riddled with DRM, so P2P was still offering a better product.

It's the same now. TV websites require a cable subscription to stream content. Why? What possible technical need is there for this. Why bow to the cable companies when you can get 100% of the profit. That is until you follow the money and notice that most these channels are owned by the cable companies. Makes sense for them to hang on to archaic business models.

 

[Brainonska511]

Which you can only get if you already have HBO, which you can only get if you already have a $60+ monthly TV service.

I wonder how long it'll take companies to figure out that people are willing to pay a la carte for quality programming. If they put the episodes up for sale at a couple bucks apiece (maybe an extra $1 for HD), they'd make tons of money and piracy would go way down.

Then again, they might also lose some cable subscribers.

But as long as you're looking at $1,000+ a year to legitimately watch a 10-episode TV series when it comes out, there are a lot of people who would never even consider subscribing in the first place.

The music industry has learned this. So has the video game industry. But from where I'm sitting, the best two ways to watch movies are Netflix ($10 a month for all the shitty movies I can stomach) and Redbox ($1.30 for fairly recent releases). It just seems ridiculous that the best way to watch reasonably new releases is to walk over to a vending machine that dispenses physical media.

It may be true that some companies still fail to realize that their distribution models need some work, but that does not still justify taking without paying.

HBO is a premium service and you'll have to pay for it regardless. I would hazard to guess that HBO makes most of its money through cable subscriptions and doesn't want to undercut it's main revenue source by offering a direct-to-consumer streaming service.

 

[Red Storm]

Pretty sure the cable companies pay HBO a shit ton of money to keep them tied to their service. However much they are paying, obviously HBO feels that it's more than they would make just offering a stream only service.

 

[Imported]

In a recent interview with CNN's Jake Tapper, "Game of Thrones" co-creator David Benioff speculated about all the special effects he could buy if those who illegally pirated the show were paying 99 cents or so per download.

I'd pay 99 cents an episode. Do it HBO.

 

[SheHateMe]

I pay $13/m for HBO and I also downloaded it. So there, you have your 99 cents.

 

[AstroManLuca]

It may be true that some companies still fail to realize that their distribution models need some work, but that does not still justify taking without paying.

HBO is a premium service and you'll have to pay for it regardless. I would hazard to guess that HBO makes most of its money through cable subscriptions and doesn't want to undercut it's main revenue source by offering a direct-to-consumer streaming service.

The cost is so high that most people wouldn't bother subscribing to cable with HBO if piracy wasn't an option. I guess that isn't really a justification, but we're not talking about lost sales here. If this was a song that costs $1 to buy legally and people were downloading it, then maybe you can talk about lost sales.

Point is that HBO is not losing money by people downloading it. They've even said they like the hype they get from downloaders - without piracy, GoT would still be popular, but it would be more of a cult show with a very small following. They definitely receive benefits from downloaders.

http://bgr.com/2013/04/01/hbo-onlin...9/?utm_source=trending-widget&utm_medium=home

Pretty sure the cable companies pay HBO a shit ton of money to keep them tied to their service. However much they are paying, obviously HBO feels that it's more than they would make just offering a stream only service.

Yeah I guess that makes sense. So it comes down to how long cable companies keep paying them so much money for their channel. If those payments start to shrink, then maybe they'll explore other options. Until then, they don't have much reason to. They make money either way, so why not just keep things as they are instead of spending resources on an online store?

 

[Anubis]

i downloaded it

I also pay 150$ a month for cable which includes HBO & i watched ep 1 when it aired at 9 on sunday

 

[OogyWaWa]

these stupid companies still haven't learned... if they make it quick & easy for anyone to download (regardless of region and other BS) at a reasonable price (usually $1 or at most <$5) and they own it (i.e. can watch as many times as they want, no drm) - people would flock to it...