Cable Company F%$#ery

South Park got it right

HBO Go is a service that allows subscribers to the HBO channel to view content on PCs, tablets, and other devices.

The kicker is that for now, though I expect this to change as it renegotiates contracts, in order to use this service, you need to have your cable/fiber company certify that you are an HBO subscriber in order to get the service.

Guess what? Comcast, the most loathed company in America, is refusing to provide this information for its subscribers:

One of the more dubious Comcast practices brought up by opponents of Comcast's planned $45 billion acquisition of Time Warner Cable is the cable giant's sluggish refusal to support certain internet video services and platforms running over its broadband network. Case in point is the HBO Go app on Roku, which Comcast hasn't supported since around 2011 or so for no coherent reason. To get the app to work, it needs to simply authenticate with the cable provider to prove you are a cable subscriber (since, at least until next year, there's no HBO Go standalone option).

Much smaller cable companies haven't had a problem in getting this to work, but Comcast, with its limited resources, somehow just can't seem to spend the time. Roku's neutrality filing with the FCC expressed concern that cable authentication systems could be used as yet another way gatekeepers could extract tolls from streaming services. As we noted when Comcast similarly refused to support HBO Go on the Playstation 3, the company -- when it can be bothered to comment on the issue at all -- usually trots out the excuse that getting this stuff to work is well, gosh -- time consuming:

"With every new website, device or player we authenticate, we need to work through technical integration and customer service which takes time and resources. Moving forward, we will continue to prioritize as we partner with various players."

It certainly does appear to be a case of priorities. With Comcast looking to eliminate any and all justifications to reject its merger, the company this week announced its network would finally support HBO Go on Roku -- some three years later. It couldn't possibly be that Comcast intentionally stalled on supporting HBO Go on the country's best-selling third-party streaming device because it wants to keep customers contained within the Comcast set top ecosystem and away from other options, could it?

I really think that if a politician of either party were to say that his goal would to make Comcast, "Squeal like a pig," he would be elected President.

But we still have politicians going to their knees to "service" the cable giants.