HBO On Netflix? Not A Chance, Says HBO

HBO On Netflix? Not A Chance, Says HBO

Netflix's recent return to profits must have made CEO Reed Hastings a wee bit giddy; buried deep in the company's new earnings report was a paragraph that teased the possibility of a Netflix-HBO partnership. Will we someday be able to stream Game of Thrones? In a word: no. After the press circulated the speculation yesterday, HBO promptly released a statement squashing the rumor with extreme prejudice.

"We are not in discussions and have no plans to work with Netflix," Reuters reports HBO spokesman Jeff Cusson as saying. Ouch. So there you have it, cord-cutters; don't get your hopes up for on-demand True Blood anytime soon -- at least if you don't have HBO Go. And since you need an HBO subscription to access HBO Go, you wouldn't be a cord cutter if you had it.

HBO's quibbles with Netflix are nothing new, and it isn't limited to streaming video. Earlier this year, HBO stopped giving Netflix a wholesale discount for DVDs of its shows, but only after Hastings publicly identified the premium movie station as Netflix's biggest rival. Oops!

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