More about Time Warner's Streaming iPad App

Time Warner’s new “TV Everywhere” iPad app may be the first step to letting cable subscribers have true portability for the programming they pay for. The new Time Warner service is limited; users can only use it in home. Also, there’s no on-demand component to it and the app is not intended to be used as a remote control, as some other cable and satellite provider apps are.

Still, even with such a limited scope, some of the content providers are not happy and reportedly <http://tinyurl.com/4z984hx> have asked Time Warner to cease and desist. Regardless of the content creators’ reticence, this seems to be just the first step in untethering TV viewers from their TV sets when it comes to live TV.

In the long run it’s hard to imagine that this is anything more than a negotiating ploy by the networks and studios. If the subscribers are already paying for it, why not let them access it from multiple locations? And isn’t the idea of remote viewing of live TV ultimately better than time shifting via DVRs? In some ways, these questions are moot; there are already third-party workarounds to allow users to access their cable or satellite programming from other locations, such as Sling Box and Vulkano.