A cable company giving something for free? No you heard it right, Time Warner Cable wants to up availability of cable content for free on the Internet.

Their TV online service to be called ‘TV Everywhere’ would show hit TV episodes of series such as Entourage, The Wire, Saving Grace and more. And although it would be a free service, it has a proviso that you must be a paid subscriber to some TV service.

The TV website would be ad revenue supported and would be viewable on portable devices as well as PC’s.

To watch the online premium content internet viewers would need to verify that they subscribe to a form of pay-TV to watch the online streams. It will not matter if your a subscriber of cable, satellite or some other form of Paid TV service.

Time Warners CEO Jeff Bewkes said:- “It’s a natural extension of the existing business model. It will preserve a robust environment for video by making sure that no matter where it is watched, it continues to benefit from a dual-revenue stream of subscriptions and advertising.”

The service which is due to be trialed sometime this year, is designed to generate incremental revenue for the Cable companies concerned about the move away from subscription based services and into the free arms of online TV sites such as Hulu.

The service is also planning to be shown on the established online TV websites such as Hulu, MySpace and YouTube. If of course these companies agree to running what is in effect a pay for service.

Susan Whiting from Nielsen said:- “It is clear that TV remains the main vehicle for viewing video, although online and mobile platforms are an increasingly important complement to live home-based television,”

The strategy by Time Warner seems to be a response to the growing number of viewers cancelling cable TV subscriptions and turning to the free services available on the internet.

Cable giant Comcast has revealed that it saw a decline of 500,000 subscriptions in the last quarter, and TW Cable have already said that cable operators must incorporate online video into their business models in order to survive.

The move will give Time Warner an internet streaming service if subscriptions continue to erode. And possibly convince them to offer a completely free service a la Hulu and other catchup TV networks.

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