This is shaping up to be a pretty good year for cord cutters who don’t want to pay for a conventional PayTV service but don’t have any qualms in subscribing to an internet TV streaming service. We know that Sony has been testing its service, PlayStation Vue, for a while now. A Sony executive has revealed in an interview that the PlayStation Vue internet TV streaming will be coming out of beta when it is launched commercially in about two weeks from now.
PlayStation Vue will initially be released in three major cities, New York City, Chicago and Philadelphia. Sony aims to take it nationwide by the end of this year. Beta testers have already been using the service in these cities for a couple of months now.
Andrew House of Sony tells The Wall Street Journal in an interview that the release is scheduled within the next two weeks. PlayStation Vue will run on the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 but Sony does have plans to offer apps for the iPad and other devices.
The service will include major channels like NBC, FOX, CBS, FX, Discovery, Comedy Central and more. It doesn’t have ESPN though so sports fans will have to look elsewhere, probably Sling TV, which has already been launched nationwide.
PlayStation Vue will allow subscribers to stream the aforementioned channels live and even watch episodes that have aired in recent days. It will even let users store shows in the cloud for up to 28 days.
Sony has still not revealed what the monthly subscription price is going to be though it is expected that subscribers will be required to pay as much as $80 per month. That’s close to cable territory.
In other internet TV streaming news, HBO confirmed its own standalone streaming service called HBO Now, which will be released next month. Sling TV is already up and running and has managed to pick up more than 100,000 subscribers in its first month alone.
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