M.G. Siegler, as part of his 500 Words series for Medium:

Assuming Learmonth’s sources are correct, HBO is just tying up loose ends (read: Apple) at this point to launch the new service alongside the premiere of season five of Game of Thrones in April.

Yes, there has to be some concern for HBO launching such a service during what will undoubtedly be peak demand — after all, they shit the bed last year during the exact same time with HBO Go — but with MLB by their side to help them this time, we should be good to go.

Will HBO Now catch on, develop the traction it needs to achieve critical mass, to legitimize the à la carte content model?

Based on how this new service fares for HBO, we should see many others fall in line to do the same thing. And given that I fully suspect this will be a massive success for the company, we could see a domino effect quicker than many imagined was possible.

When ESPN tips and goes straight to their users: watch out.

It’s not so much the cord-cutters that Big Cable has to worry about, it’s the upcoming millions of cord-nevers — kids who head off to college or their first jobs and don’t feel like cable television is worth the cost. I would bet on a huge percentage of those kids signing up for HBO Now to go with their Netflix accounts.

On Apple TV:

The current Apple TV has a nice chunk of content, but Apple needs to make it a no-brainer for consumers to go with their offering. That means getting all (or at least most) of the content currently offered on television. Up until now, that has seemingly meant working with the cable providers. But if the aforementioned domino effect happens, Apple could have a much easier time getting what they want (whether that’s dealing with networks directly or using them as leverage to bend the cable operators to their will — we’ll see).

Couldn’t agree more. This is a shrewd partnership for Apple and could be the discriminator that breathes life into Apple TV sales.