After first announcing its plans in January, Sony revealed a new online live TV streaming service on Thursday called PlayStation Vue. Sony says the new service “reinvents the television experience.” It’s not clear what that means beyond switching to an Internet-based delivery platform. But it appears Sony is building personalization features and robust discovery methods into Vue so you can find what you want to watch without much effort. Sony’s new Vue combines live TV streaming with a catalog of recent and past episodes from popular television shows.
Sony is pressing play on a new web-based television service that represents an attempt to transform the way people watch based on its experience in gaming. Called PlayStation Vue, the service initially will require a PlayStation gaming console and will offer a personalized, searchable approach to watching live and on-demand television that is delivered over an Internet connection. Sony plans to announce this subscription service on Thursday and will start testing it this month with a select group of viewers in New York. It will be offered in other cities in the first quarter of 2015. Sony will introduce PlayStation Vue as a package of about 75 TV channels, a smaller version of a typical cable offering. Through deals with six television groups, the service will include the broadcast networks CBS, NBC and Fox in some regions, with dozens of popular cable networks such as USA, FX, Discovery, Bravo, MTV, Comedy Central and the Food Network.