'Game of Thrones' premiere downs HBO Go for hours
HBO apologized to "Game of Thrones" fans who were hoping to watch the premiere on the company's streaming service.
While the fourth-season premiere was kicking off on HBO last night, the company was busy trying to fix its own streaming service, HBO Go. As fans of the fantasy series took to their devices to stream "Game of Thrones," HBO reported on Twitter that the load had taken its streaming service to its knees.
"Looks like there's trouble in the realm," HBO tweeted. "Apologies for the inconvenience. We'll be providing updates, so please stay tuned."
HBO Go is the subscription-based television network's answer to Netflix, Amazon Instant Video, Hulu Plus, and other streaming services. But unlike those offerings, which all include content from many different providers, HBO Go includes only its own library of movies, series, documentaries, and sports events.
This is the second time in as many months that HBO Go has buckled under the pressure of rabid fans. Last month, ""="" shortcode="link" asset-type="article" uuid="159cadda-0902-47fd-bac5-e4f06efb900a" slug="see-true-detective-finale-crash-hbo-go-in-one-chart" link-text="HBO Go was taken down at the hands of the finale of " section="news" title="See 'True Detective' finale crash HBO Go in one chart" edition="us" data-key="link_bulk_key" api="{"id":"159cadda-0902-47fd-bac5-e4f06efb900a","slug":"see-true-detective-finale-crash-hbo-go-in-one-chart","contentType":null,"edition":"us","topic":{"slug":"media-streamers"},"metaData":{"typeTitle":null,"hubTopicPathString":"Tech^Home Entertainment^Media Streamers","reviewType":null},"section":"news"}"> a crime drama starring Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey.
Angry fans took to Twitter to express their displeasure with the HBO Go outage. One tweet perhaps summed up the average user's opinion on the outage, saying, "HBO Go is dropping the ball not letting us stream 'Game of Thrones.'"
To its credit, HBO provided regular updates during the four-hour outage, but that did little to quell the unrest. Finally, HBO was forced to tell its subscribers through its HBO Go Twitter account to consider watching the premiere on its channel at the next re-run time.
HBO apologized to its users before finally restoring HBO Go service at 11 p.m. PT.
CNET has contacted HBO for comment on the outage. We will update this story when we have more information.