HBO Admits They Trolled Fans with “The Sight”

When HBO first introduced ThreeEyedRaven.com back in November of last year, I thought it was a splendid notion. A website that was 100% dedicated to Game of Thrones and new tied in Game of Thrones content. What superfan wouldn’t want to see HBO sponsor such a thing? And if you remember back, the original video they introduced the site with was a YouTube clip. Like a trailer, but teaser length and slightly mysterious.

Then the trouble started. Over the next three months, as we waited impatiently for the delayed trailer (held for IMAX) we got a series of ever-more frustrating “glimpses” into Season 5, with The Raven’s site. Most of the time, they didn’t work. And when you could make them work, you could only watch them once–and when you finally got your hands on a YouTube video someone made on their mobile device, most of what you saw was from earlier seasons. It was bizarre. At first, I thought someone at HBO had gotten way into Snapchat.

Turns out it wasn’t that at all. Instead, HBO execs admitted at SxSW that they were just having fun with us.

At least, according to Mashable, at the SxSW panel, that was how it was explained.

The unusually candid, always entertaining [Melissa] Eccles spent the bulk of the panel boasting about the five-second “visions” of Game of Thrones’ upcoming Season 5, which were distributed via various digital methods earlier this year.

“We basically manipulated you guys,” she said. “It was super fun. I have a mean streak in me; I couldn’t help it.”

“We weaponized time,” Eccles said. “We took away the one thing you want, which is the ability to watch it again. Rarely do we get the opportunity to piss our audience off like this. We knew people were going to be pretty angry, but it’s the best angry you can have. They were frustrated; they were manipulated; they wanted you to do it again.”

A total of 3 million fans attempted to watch the first vision within 24 hours — but untold numbers of them, unaware of the 90-second burn rule, clicked on the link too late.

“Honestly, we wanted everyone to feel just a little bit violated,” Eccles said, adding that the resulting social media backlash was exactly what she was looking for. “Man, people were pissed.”

Yes, everyone. HBO did that deliberately. And if you thought they weren’t listening to our cranky tweets and pissy blog posts about it, you’re wrong. They monitored us the whole time, and even seem proud of it.

Her team kept track of the emotional sentiment in social responses, many of which tended toward “aggression, anger and sarcasm.”

Which, of course, was exactly the point.

Well then!

We just got had everyone. Congratulations. Though, to be fair, at least this is finally an explanation that makes sense. After all, the whole stunt didn’t make a whole lot of sense monetarily. Clicks are still the currency of the Internet. If HBO was looking to do something serious, they would have put these things on YouTube. By having these videos be these one shot “burner” deals, HBO was basically giving away a million clicks each time to one lucky fan who was fast enough with their record button and mobile device, and then won the lottery of putting it in front of the right bloggers first, therefore ensuring every entertainment website used their version. More than once, I noted that the video we were posting was uploaded by someone with nearly no other content on their channel, and maybe 25 views on their other stuff…and then this one Game of Thrones clip that would rack up hundreds of thousands of views within the next few days.

But you have to admit, at least what they posted was on the cheap, and they managed to keep our attention. Just as we all got too bored and frustrated by the single videos, they started to release different versions to different people. And just as we got tired of having no new content, after the first trailer hit, they went and posted the Brienne and Jon and Mance clips, both of which we assume were from the premiere. (Both of which, you should note, HBO then uploaded to YouTube. Because clicks.)

• Published on 03/19/2015 at 9:30 AM CDT
• Last updated on 10/21/2016 at 1:06 PM CDT