TV Everywhere

TV Everywhere (also sometimes known as authenticated streaming or authenticated video on-demand) refers to a business model wherein television broadcasters—particularly cable networks, allow their customers to access content from their network through internet-based services—either live or on-demand, as an aspect of their subscription to the service. TV Everywhere systems utilize accounts provided by a user's respective television provider—which are used to verify whether the user is a subscriber to a particular channel, thus allowing or denying access to the content. Time Warner Cable first proposed the concept in 2009; in 2010, many television providers and networks began to roll out TV Everywhere services for their subscribers, including major networks such as ESPN, HBO, and NBC (particularly for its Olympics coverage).Although providers have touted the advantages of being able to access content across multiple platforms (including on the internet, and on mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets) as part of their television subscription, TV Everywhere services have been criticized for being difficult for end-users to set up, while media activists have criticized the concept for merely extending the existing oligarchy of the subscription television industry to the internet, and considering it to be collusion against ""cord cutters""—those who drop cable and satellite entirely in favor of accessing content via terrestrial television, the internet, and subscription video on demand (SVOD) services.