UNTIL recently, I’d thought broadcast television might have some future with sport.
John Griffiths.
Who wants to tune in each week for another episode of a partially remembered series when you can settle in for the night to watch three or four (or more) episodes back to back?
This move started with DVD box sets but the rise of Streaming Video On Demand (SVOD) services has totally kicked it over the cliff.
You might like Stan, or Presto, or Quickflicks, but for most of us it’s Netflix and there’s no going back.
I fire up the tuner on my TV for news and sport now. Even news is of increasingly dubious value except when something really big is breaking.
But something happened a few weeks ago that increasingly has me thinking sport will be no safe harbour for the TV broadcasters.
A publicist for the NFL in the US tweeted at me that she’d like to send me some stuff and I should email her.
Very warily I said “hi” and she asked for an address to send a package to.
Even more warily, I gave her the address for the palatial “CityNews” suites and promptly forgot about it.
In due course, a courier clomped up to the front desk and deposited a great big box full of American football merchandise.
A few things are clear.
With the interest in Jarryd Hayne the NFL had decided the time was right for a charm offensive in Australia.
I’m guessing they rounded up every Australian journo with more than 1000 Twitter followers to send the package to.
What they were really pushing was the “NFL Network”. For a bit over $100 you can sign up to watch, via streaming video, every one of your chosen team’s games in the regular season.
For around $250 you can watch every team’s games.
Compare this with the cost of Foxtel over the whole season and, if American Football is your sport of choice, it becomes pretty compelling.
How many rugby fans in Canberra would shell out $100 to be able to watch every Brumbies game of a season and cut out the rest of the Foxtel crap?
How about the Raiders fans forever bellyaching that their team can’t get on the broadcast?
The TV broadcast model in general has been built on a network paying a sport for the rights, selling a bunch of advertising and having that ad money support the rest of their bloated organisations.
Sports, not wanting to get down in the weeds of managing subscriptions or owning broadcast facilities, thought this was a pretty good deal.
But dis-intermediation is the real driver of digital disruption and turnkey platforms are pretty much here for the sports.
The fans have money they’re very willing to pay to see their teams play. The cost of delivering directly to them has come down hugely.
It’s a very exciting time for everyone, except the broadcast networks.
Infomercials and reality TV served to the ageing audience who don’t know how to make the stream play on the TV is going to be a pale shadow of these former cultural juggernauts.
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