HBO Imagine: A New Perspective or a New Way to Waste Time?

By Rigel Celeste on October 26th, 2009

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HBO has launched HBO Imagine, a unique online experience that’s hoping to change the way we all watch TV. Or at least the way we all watch TV online.

It’s complicated, but what they’re trying to do, basically, is tell a story in a nonlinear series of interconnected short clips, all available from more than just one perspective. For example, the story opens with a two minute video called “The Affair” that you can watch from four different camera angles, each revealing something new that you didn’t see before. The stories get quite complicated and part of the intended fun is guessing what you think might really be going on. The HBO Imagine site is organized like a big map that shows how all the various clips are connected to each other and keeps track of your progress as you go.

I’m not sure how I feel about it, really. While it’s certainly a creative, unique experience, and I always give props to people for doing something different, I can’t really see myself spending hours navigating around that map watching video after video and not getting distracted by something else online — people having affairs with each other just doesn’t strike me as that interesting. But then I am only 14% of the way in, maybe if I give it a few more minutes it’ll grow on me. Or not.