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National Hockey League Embraces TV Placeshifting
Egadfly writes "The 'placeshifting' technology that allows digitally recorded shows to be watched in several locations is growing increasingly popular. One particular reason for this popularity is because it enables sports fans to view locally blacked-out games over the Internet. The National Hockey League (NHL) has announced that it will actively support placeshifting by signing an agreement with SlingBox-maker Sling Media. The agreement will allow the company's "Clip+Sling" technologyto share both live and recorded NHL programming over the Internet. Significantly, this has happened only days after Major League Baseball (MLB) launched a public denunciation of placeshifting, accusing SlingBox owners of violating the law by sending television content over the Internet and accusing Sling Media itself of violating contracts with cable and satellite TV companies."
Somebody's watching. Unlike MLB, I guess they're getting used to new shifts in tech.
Plus, given the strike, and the fact that NHL hasn't enjoyed the same American fan-backing other sports have, I'm pretty sure they're just happy someone's watching.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
I'm betting this is almost entirely due to the terrible ratings the NHL has been getting in the U.S. recently. Game 3 of the finals had a record low for NBC (lower than reruns of their crappy dramas!)
...that content creators make is EASIER for me to watch the content that they create. This can only mean more viewers, watching more of the content they create, which is a good thing all around.
Unlike MLB, which wants you to only watch their content on their terms. Screw that!
Back in 1996, FoxTrax came into existence. It used state of the art technology to wrap the puck in a "glow" onscreen (and for kicks Fox added "comet trails" to the puck when it was fired at high speeds).
You know what? It COMPLETELY SUCKED. You know why? Because ANY IDIOT can see a black object against a bright white surface.
Not to mention, it was completely invasive. Contrast it with the yellow line shown during football games. Out of the way and easily ignored.
Hockey's problem in America isn't that Americans can't see the puck. Americans so the puck just fine during the NHL resurgence back in the 90s. Hockey's problem is that Americans won't return to any sport after a lockout unless the players have salaries greater than the GNP of some small nations (baseball).
It really depends on where you are, too. The upper midwest states are heavy into hockey of all levels. MN broadcasts its highschool hockey tournament live, for example (which lasts about a week). Until I moved from MN, I had no idea NHL wasn't on par with the NFL and MLB in terms of viewership in the US.
Indeed, plus, it's pretty damn easy to *infer* where the puck is from the actions of the players onscreen.
Though I gotta say, I got an HDTV a few months ago, and hockey in HD is friggin awesome.
I certainly wouldn't mind seeing a retraction on the number of teams in the NHL. Canada and northern US cities would be fine with me. I guess the probelem is the owners would mind. They just want more and more and bigger and bigger, and that means the American market.
Everything's got to be huge, on huge primetime TVs and in huge stadiums in huge cities for them. And for some stupid reason they think that a city with a population of 500,000 where 1% care about hockey is a better market than a city with 100,000 where everyone cares about hockey.
Oh, well
Free the Quark 3 from asymptotic confinement! Bring your charm! Don't get down! All colours and flavours welcome!
Right on. The way to hook new viewers is "Hook them with the hits, keep them with the skill." Once people begin watching hockey, they'll pick up on the intricacies of the game. I'm still amazed at the little techniques that players use to affect how a play develops. Little things like deflecting a puck a little bit, slowing down the opposing team, stuff like that. It's ridiculous that more Americans aren't into hockey. It's so much more interesting to me than football.
The NHL has never, ever had great ratings on national television. Part of this is indeed a lack of interest. The NHL will never have the interest of any of the other three major sports, and somebody's got to be fourth. But the other major problem is quality hockey in quality markets. Ottawa and Anaheim in this year's finals, Carolina and Edmonton in last years. Why did the ratings suck? because if you add up the populations of those four (Anaheim proper, excluding LA) cities, you're probably not much bigger than Chicago. They could have drawn a 30 share in the American team's city and not made a dent nationally. It's the nature of the sport. Hell, NBC national games featuring Detroit and Buffalo (cradles of US hockey) performed poorly on a national level, but drew Super Bowl-level interest locally. For the NHL to make a dent in national TV ratings, they need a New York Rangers - Los Angeles Kings final every year. (I'd say an Islanders - Kings final, but who are we kidding? I'll sniff a super model's panties before the Isle's sniff a Stanley Cup Finals game.)
FYI NBC does not pay the NHL for rights to broadcast games nationally. Even if hockey draws poorly, it's essentially free to the network. NBC is well aware of how Hockey draws in the US, but knows that they will always make money on any game they show. Some of their Saturday games this year did outdraw the competing NBA games.
As for the deal with slingbox, it's not really desperation. The NHL just landed a fat deal to stay on CBC in Canada (THANK GOD) that dwarfs any of the money Poker and UFC are getting. This on top of the waaaaaaaaay overpriced deal that Comcast (owners of Versus) coughed up in an attempt to legitimize their network (and to give a middle finger to ESPN). Being the red headed stepchild of pro-sports gives Hockey a chance to reach out. Hockey needs to keep it's ratings where they are. They can't afford to alienate even a small percentage of their remaining fan base and if they can find an edge, any edge, to pull an extra 50 or 100k pairs of eyes, they'll do it. Maybe enough folks will latch on to the idea to make the big sports change their tune.
There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
I don't know if desperation move is exactly the thing to call this. I think it's more being innovative and taking steps to embrace technology to help move the sport forward. The league knows it needs to change its ways or basically die and being the first league to really embrace technology could help it survive. It's not the most pressing issue but it will help. The league really needs to contract a few teams, and restructure the style of play to the way it once was. Open up the ice, eliminate the trap, and reduce the size of goalies pads for starters would be good. The other leagues have a long history of viciously protecting their television rights and any technological advancements have always scared owners of pro teams. Baseball wasn't put on television until much later than it should have been because owners thought no one would show up for the games if they could just watch it on television. They were obviously proved wrong, media and technology have done nothing but add to the promotion of sport yet the owners still can't acknowledge this as new technologies arise. In my opinion anything that exposes the sport to more people is positive for the game, and I`m glad a league is finally taking a step to embrace new technological capabilities.
Bingo. That why like here in MN, the season ticket waiting list for the Wild is years long. I actually was not able to purchase a ticket this year from TicketMaster, not even one, and I tried often. The only three games I saw live were vendor perks.
I don't know how live viewership is doing in other states really, but if in MN the NHL is in no way on life-support for live viewership. Of course, that may just be good news for the XCEL center, not the NHL. Come to think of it I wonder what the NHL's revenue difference is from ticket sales vs. TV networks running the feed...
1. A team south of the Mason-Dixon line doesn't deserve to win the cup according to some canadians albeit the team probably has more canadian players than the opponent.
2. Garry Bettman is evil and only panders to US needs.
3. Winnipeg and Quebec deserve their teams back.
4. Don Cherry is fair and balanced in his views especially when it comes to european players.
5. If your team loses there must be something wrong with the referees (universal)
6. If you're seeing a blackhawks homegame on tv in Chicago you're on drugs.
7. If the other stanley cup finalist has an european captain they will lose.
8. If you don't speak french and play for the Canadiens you're shit out of luck when it comes to the media. Mon dieu.
9. Russians stop playing after they get a big contract.
10. Pronger debunks newtonian physics and comes up with his own. Don Cherry praises him for it since he's a good canadian boy with a heart of gold.
There's probably even more which I forgot as usual but in general when hockey fans start arguing about the sports logic is the 1st casualty and truth the 2nd but it's like that with most sports. Slingbox deal is a step in the right direction but what I'd really like them to come up with is a streaming service where one could just watch the games you want for a modest fee but I really doubt this will happen anytime soon.