HBO, Comcast, Verizon, Others Bringing Stuff to Xbox 360

There were rumors Microsoft was preparing to announce a massive amount of content providers for Xbox Live from the entertainment world, and while Microsoft made things official today, there are plenty of important details being left out.

Microsoft is now confirming Bravo, Comcast, HBO GO, Verizon FiOS and Syfy for the US; BBC in the U.K., Telefónica in Spain; Rogers On Demand in Canada; Televisa in Mexico; ZDF in Germany; and MediaSet in Italy. That's in addition to web-based services like AlloCiné, Crackle, Dailymotion, iHeartRadio, MSN with MSNBC.com, The Today Show, TMZ, VEVO and YouTube.

What we're getting out of each service remains to be seen.

In a blog post, Comcast outlined details about its push on Xbox 360, which says this initiative would specifically be Comcast's "Xfinity On Demand service." In other words, your Xbox 360 is not suddenly becoming your Comcast DVR. With Verizon, however, you will have access to "a selection of popular live TV channels."

These services will also tie into Kinect, as well.

Right now, it appears additions like HBO GO and Xfinity On Demand, will not require Xbox Live Gold. It's not listed as such in Microsoft's press release or Major Nelson's blog, but other services Microsoft has added to Xbox Live in the past, such as Twitter, Netflix and Facebook, have required Gold. I'm waiting to hear back from Microsoft on this.

This content arrives sometime "this holiday." My money would be when the dashboard update is live.

Here's the full list. * means it requires Gold and/or another subscription, ** means it's already available.

• ABC iView - Australia
• AlloCiné - France, Germany, Spain, U.K.
• Antena 3 - Spain
• Astral Media's Disney XD - Canada
• AT&T** - U.S.
• BBC - U.K.
• blinkbox - U.K.
• Bravo - U.S.
• BSkyB** - U.K.
• Canal+* - France, Spain
• Channel 4 - U.K.
• Channel 5 - U.K.
• CinemaNow (Best Buy) - U.S.
• Comcast - U.S.
• Crackle - Australia, Canada, U.K., U.S.
• Dailymotion - Available in 32 markets
• EPIX - U.S.
• ESPN** - U.S.
• Facebook** - Available in all 35 Xbox LIVE markets
• FOXTEL** - Australia
• GolTV - Spain
• HBO GO - U.S.
• Hulu - Japan
• Hulu +**- U.S.
• iHeartRadio (Clear Channel) - U.S.
• Last.fm** - U.K., U.S.
• LOVEFiLM - Germany, U.K.
• Manga Entertainment - U.S.
• Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment/Real Sports - Canada
• MediaSet - Italy
• MSN with MSNBC.com - Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Spain, U.K.
• MUZU.TV - France, Germany, Italy, Spain, U.K.
• Netflix**- Canada, U.S.
• Rogers On Demand Online (RODO) - Canada
• RTVE - Spain
• SBS On Demand - Australia
• Syfy - U.S.
• Telefonica - Spain
• Televisa - Mexico
• The Today Show - U.S.
• TELUS** - Canada
• TMZ - U.S.
• Twitter** - Available in all 35 Xbox LIVE markets
• UFC - Canada, U.S.
• Verizon - U.S.
• VEVO - Canada, U.K., U.S.
• VimpelCom** - Russia
• Vodafone Portugal** - Portugal
• YouTube - Available in 22 markets
• ZDF - Germany
• Zune** - Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain

That's cool

@Swoxx said:

That's cool

You're cool.

Sweet.

@Crunchman said:

@Swoxx said:

That's cool

You're cool.

Thanks dude, means a lot

I don't give a shit. This isn't what people want. This is exactly what I said I was afraid it was going to be back when we started hearing about it at E3. It's just "we can replace your digital tuner cable box" rather than "we can replace your cable company".

I unsubscribed from my cable company years ago. I won't go back to them. I'm not going to subscribe to them just so I can get their service via the 360 interface. Just give me the actual content directly from the 360 and Microsoft (or the PS3 and Sony). Charge me a subscription fee or whatever you want. Let me time-shift, archive, search and whatever else. Give me a huge variety of content to choose from. Don't make me choose bullshit "premium" or "basic" or any other packages. And we might start to have a deal.

Otherwise . . . this is a real underwhelming lackluster unveiling.

Oh wow? is it just signing in with our id and password for the service? That is crazy!

It's all good as long as it leads to Giant Bomb content on my Xbox!!!

@Branthog said:

I don't give a shit. This isn't what people want. This is exactly what I said I was afraid it was going to be back when we started hearing about it at E3. It's just "we can replace your digital tuner cable box" rather than "we can replace your cable company".

I unsubscribed from my cable company years ago. I won't go back to them. I'm not going to subscribe to them just so I can get their service via the 360 interface. Just give me the actual content directly from the 360 and Microsoft (or the PS3 and Sony). Charge me a subscription fee or whatever you want. Let me time-shift, archive, search and whatever else. Give me a huge variety of content to choose from. Don't make me choose bullshit "premium" or "basic" or any other packages. And we might start to have a deal.

Otherwise . . . this is a real underwhelming lackluster unveiling.

It's not THAT grim. It's at least a step in the right direction.

Welcome to the future, where our PC's will be polluted with 25 different download managers and instead of paying for cable tv, we'll have to maintain 40 different subscriptions to streaming content companies. All while ISP's complain about bandwidth.

Not sure I want all that to be honest, I want a game console that plays games. Guess those days are dead, bloody hate that new design to. But anything as got to be better then the current design.

Sweet, ABC and SBS on my xbox. Just what I always wanted!

@bkbroiler said:

@Branthog said:

I don't give a shit. This isn't what people want. This is exactly what I said I was afraid it was going to be back when we started hearing about it at E3. It's just "we can replace your digital tuner cable box" rather than "we can replace your cable company".

I unsubscribed from my cable company years ago. I won't go back to them. I'm not going to subscribe to them just so I can get their service via the 360 interface. Just give me the actual content directly from the 360 and Microsoft (or the PS3 and Sony). Charge me a subscription fee or whatever you want. Let me time-shift, archive, search and whatever else. Give me a huge variety of content to choose from. Don't make me choose bullshit "premium" or "basic" or any other packages. And we might start to have a deal.

Otherwise . . . this is a real underwhelming lackluster unveiling.

It's not THAT grim. It's at least a step in the right direction.

Not enough to make it a more compelling service than Netflix+BT.

exciting

Oh great. So Ireland continues to pay full price for a bare-bones service. Wonderful news.

But hey, we still have Zune...

@Branthog said:

I don't give a shit. This isn't what people want. This is exactly what I said I was afraid it was going to be back when we started hearing about it at E3. It's just "we can replace your digital tuner cable box" rather than "we can replace your cable company".

I unsubscribed from my cable company years ago. I won't go back to them. I'm not going to subscribe to them just so I can get their service via the 360 interface. Just give me the actual content directly from the 360 and Microsoft (or the PS3 and Sony). Charge me a subscription fee or whatever you want. Let me time-shift, archive, search and whatever else. Give me a huge variety of content to choose from. Don't make me choose bullshit "premium" or "basic" or any other packages. And we might start to have a deal.

Otherwise . . . this is a real underwhelming lackluster unveiling.

My gf and I turned off our cable about six or seven months ago and bought an antenna. That gets us our local channels in HD, and we Tivo all of the network shows we want to watch. We also subscribe to Netflix and Hulu Plus, although we're going to cancel Hulu Plus because most of the content you want to see is only available through a web browser and not through the PS3 Hulu app or the Roku hooked to our set in the bedroom. On the whole we're much happier and would never go back to cable unless pricing for Netflix shot up dramatically (e.g. $40 a month). In that case we'd just use antenna because the HD tuner is as good as cable.

Anyway, I say all that to reinforce what you're saying here. It's not what I want, be it on 360 or PS3. I want to stream HBO shows, but I don't want to sign up for cable to do it. It's a waste of money for a lot of content I will never watch.

I'll stick with Netflix. :)

HBO Go is nice because right now I can only watch it on my iPad and it has WAY more shows than FiOS On Demand does. Other than that, there's nothing for me here.

Here's a question, though. If I want to watch FiOS on four TVs, I'd need four set top boxes. If have a 360, can I dump one of the set top boxes and save myself the $5/month?

great. i just LOOOOOOOOOVE living in Poland. eh, at least we have iTunes store (it launched last week...) :y

No cox? Bah glad me and the gf are getting Verizon at the new place.

@keef: I payed a one time fee for something called "PlayOn", when I payed it it was 40$. One of the many many features it does is stream hulu, the web based hulu, to your 360 or PS3. It has some hiccups, and has to be updated often, but is so completely worth it. It will also stream all videos on your computer to your 360, no matter the format. Youtube, whatever you want. I personally went out and found a giantbomb app someone wrote for it, so I can watch quicklooks on my 360 as well. It seems to be about what you're looking for.

I don't have cable TV now (not even local TV) and don't want it. This service is not useful. It's bloatware.

I just want to subscribe to HBO and use HBO Go, is that too much to ask? Damn cable companies.

@014: As someone who enjoys watching TV, I have to say it's not bloatware at all. I can't think of a single good interface on a cable box. Being able to use a decent interface for onDemand content is pretty cool. I'm a comcast user, and while the cable box interface is a fucking piece of shit, the web interface is actually pretty good.

I'm just gonna play games on my xbox I could care less about this garbage.

BBC? Count me in. Wish they'd bring lovefilm to the Xbox in the UK. I don't use either of my ps3s so I need it on the olde xbox.

@Clubvodka: LoveFilm is on the list, I might consider upgradeding my package to streaming now

Most half way decent shows on now, are on-demand online. I'll watch basic television off an antenna to get crystal clear tv, and the only thing I watch that isn't available online live, is wwe raw. Which...perhaps next year, thats probably going to happen.

No thanks. I have Netflix...I just download whatever show I want to watch :)

Sadly, we only have Cox in my area. So a bummer

@Branthog said:

Just give me the actual content directly from the 360 and Microsoft (or the PS3 and Sony). Charge me a subscription fee or whatever you want. Let me time-shift, archive, search and whatever else. Give me a huge variety of content to choose from. Don't make me choose bullshit "premium" or "basic" or any other packages. And we might start to have a deal.

Don't the Xbox and PSN stores already have this option? It's fairly overpriced, but the last time I browsed through the Zune Videos or whatever the heck it's called they seemed to have a ton of varied content. I think I spent like 10 minutes watching previews of Beavis and Butthead episodes

I don't understand who this helps. I already have a cablebox next to my tv.....

Iplayer and 4od is good news, I was hoping they'd show up at some point, there's a few comedy series that 4od has archived that I wouldn't mind watching but never fancied sitting through while at my PC so this helps with that.

BBC, BSkyB, 40D - I'm happy.

@Geo7877 said:

I just want to subscribe to HBO and use HBO Go, is that too much to ask? Damn cable companies.

Yeah this. I have Midcontinent and they're taking their sweet time on getting HBO Go.

Like I'll ever see any of this in my country.

@Vandersveldt said:

@keef: I payed a one time fee for something called "PlayOn", when I payed it it was 40$. One of the many many features it does is stream hulu, the web based hulu, to your 360 or PS3. It has some hiccups, and has to be updated often, but is so completely worth it. It will also stream all videos on your computer to your 360, no matter the format. Youtube, whatever you want. I personally went out and found a giantbomb app someone wrote for it, so I can watch quicklooks on my 360 as well. It seems to be about what you're looking for.

Hmm, can I watch Hulu Plus content with it? Or does it stream from Hulu as an anonymous user?

I have Shaw in Canada. Do I get anything?

@014 said:

I don't have cable TV now (not even local TV) and don't want it. This service is not useful. It's bloatware.

because its not useful to you does not mean its not useful to others. All you have to do it no update your xbox EVER and you will never have the full service of it.

I don't have cable TV now (not even local TV) and don't want it. This service is not useful. It's bloatware.

@Branthog: Well if you are comparing paid services to just stealing content I think your expectations are skewed.

@dox said:

@Branthog: Well if you are comparing paid services to just stealing content I think your expectations are skewed.

We'll dismiss the point of "stealing" being inaccurate and focus on the point that things like Netflix have reduced the amount which people are acquiring content via bit torrent. If you make it the right price with the right interface and offer the right variety of content with the least amount of bullshit barriers, people will opt to use your legitimate service over the hassles of doing it any other way.

Having to get a $100-$200/mo cable subscription so that you can get the $15/mo HBO subscription, so that you can watch your HBO content on your XBOX or iPAD (HBOGO) is not the way to accomplish any of that. These content licensing and distribution deals need to catch up to the 21st century.

@McShank: Well, I sold my 360 over a year ago. It didn't get used.

Cool, more choices can only be good!

For those who don't know: Lovefilm is basically a Netflix from amazon. Only in Germany and UK so far.

A service to watch.

wait, Canada isn't getting totally screwed for once?

I'm shocked

The more and more they keep piling this crap into Xbox Live, the less I want anything to do with it. How about instead of mashing in as much media and consumer content as you possibly can, you focus on, oh I don't know, GAMES?! I don't know, maybe I'm just crazy, but I'm pretty sure that's why people bought a 360, not to watch TV from freaking Comcast of ALL companies...

This is awesome, been waiting for this for ages. But I want Maple Leaf Sports Entertainment in the UK!

@Geo7877 said:

I just want to subscribe to HBO and use HBO Go, is that too much to ask? Damn cable companies.

this