There are two ways to look at the news that HBO accidentally leaked the next episode of its hit show "Game of Thrones," airing it Wednesday on HBO Nordic and HBO España.
First, there's the irony of the premium cable network accidentally throwing its own valuable episode out there early after hackers leaked emails and scripts and demanded a ransom to not leak more. It wasn't, in the end, the hackers who gave the episode away, it was HBO itself, or at least a vendor who worked with the company.
"We have learned that the upcoming episode of 'Game of Thrones' was accidentally posted for a brief time on the HBO Nordic and HBO España platforms," HBO said in a statement obtained by Gizmodo. "The error appears to have originated with a third-party vendor and the episode was removed as soon as it was recognized. This is not connected to the recent cyber incident at HBO in the US."
If you've ever made a big embarrassing error at a job, you know there's a real person somewhere who hit the wrong button or typed in the wrong code and is either horrified or fired, or both. Think Cersei was enraged at Oleanna Tyrell? Somebody at HBO's vendor is wishing for that nice simple painless cup of poison about now. Jaime? Jaime?
And for those of us who can't be blamed for the goof, there's the temptation. Even if you'd never seek out and watch the leaked episode, do we look for spoilers from those who have?