HBO Go planning to add livestreaming sports in 2013

Lately, premium cable network HBO’s executive team has been rather open about the future of its streaming service HBO Go, and not just when it comes to original TV shows.

HBO Sports president Ken Hershman told a group of people at Harvard’s Sport’s Law Symposium yesterday that the network is actively pursuing the idea of putting livestreaming sporting events on HBO Go in 2013, according to Nieman Journalism Lab assistant editor Justin Ellis, who attended the event. However, The Verge is reporting that HBO has no intentions of adding live sports to the streaming service anytime soon.

HBO is known for providing excellent sports commentary and for its coverage of boxing via its After Dark series, both of which are available on HBO Go after they air on the TV channel. If true, livestreaming sports programming would go a long way towards getting people to spend big bucks on a stand-alone HBO Go plan.

Last week HBO chief exec Richard Plepler theorized that the company would eventually offer its HBO Go service as part of a bundled plan that included a broadband Internet subscription. And while Plepler said the network would “need to make the numbers work,” a more expensive HBO plan would have to offer more than just access to on-demand movies and original TV shows like Game of Thrones, Girls, Newsroom, and True Blood. Yet, it’s much more likely that livestreaming sports content will arrive for those that pay for cable before anything.

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