Cold vs. Hot Observables

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh242977(v=vs.103).aspx

Cold observables start running upon subscription, i.e., the observable sequence only starts pushing values to the observers when Subscribe is called. Values are also not shared among subscribers. This is different from hot observables such as mouse move events or stock tickers which are already producing values even before a subscription is active. When an observer subscribes to a hot observable sequence, it will get the current value in the stream. The hot observable sequence is shared among all subscribers, and each subscriber is pushed the next value in the sequence. For example, even if no one has subscribed to a particular stock ticker, the ticker will continue to update its value based on market movement. When a subscriber registers interest in this ticker, it will automatically get the latest tick.
The following example demonstrates a cold observable sequence. In this example, we use the Interval operator to create a simple observable sequence of numbers pumped out at specific intervals, in this case, every 1 second.
Two observers then subscribe to this sequence and print out its values. You will notice that the sequence is reset for each subscriber, in which the second subscription will restart the sequence from the first value.

IObservable<int> source = Observable.Interval(TimeSpan.FromSeconds(1));   

IDisposable subscription1 = source.Subscribe(
                x => Console.WriteLine("Observer 1: OnNext: {0}", x),
                ex => Console.WriteLine("Observer 1: OnError: {0}", ex.Message),
                () => Console.WriteLine("Observer 1: OnCompleted"));

IDisposable subscription2 = source.Subscribe(
                x => Console.WriteLine("Observer 2: OnNext: {0}", x),
                ex => Console.WriteLine("Observer 2: OnError: {0}", ex.Message),
                () => Console.WriteLine("Observer 2: OnCompleted"));

Console.WriteLine("Press any key to unsubscribe");
Console.ReadLine();
subscription1.Dispose();
subscription2.Dispose();