
Amazon wins streaming rights for Thursday Night Football - huac
http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Daily/Closing-Bell/2017/04/04/NFL-TNF.aspx
======
dmix
I hope Amazon markets this properly. My GF and I both struggled to even find
the [https://www.primevideo.com/](https://www.primevideo.com/) landing page
after we signed up. They have two different interfaces... the amazon.com video
section and a seemingly unrelated Prime Video site which was difficult to find
on their site. I had to use chrome://history the following day after signing
up for the 30-day trial.

Amazon is great at specific UX functionality but not so great at high-level
information architecture.

Prime Video has a superior video player to Netflix thanks to the XRay feature
which tells you which actors/songs are currently playing/acting during the
current scene. I've used it countless times.

Speaking of Xray, for sports it would be great to see which players are
currently on the field/court during a game, including which jersey number, and
if possible the box score when you hover over the game. That would have been
amazing during NCAA March Madness where I didn't know most of the young
college players.

The only thing missing from the Amazon player which Netflix has is "skip intro
credits" button.

I love this technology/product competition between the two none-the-less.

~~~
hkmurakami
Xray is powered by IMDB, which Amazon also owns right? Is there an entity they
could buy to power such a service for sports?

~~~
ukyrgf
X-ray shows the actors that are in that specific scene. Does IMDB have this
information that they just don't show on their public site? That seems a lot
more useful of a database than the few titles Prime offers it on.

~~~
tootie
That feature is damn impressive. It's incredibly responsive and accurate.

------
caseysoftware
The big reason many people have to _not_ canceling their cable is live sports.

If this is the new trend, it's catastrophic to cable providers.

~~~
donretag
On the flipside, many have cut the cord because of the high cost of cable,
partly due to the cost being inflated by being forced to have channels such as
ESPN. Amazon purchasing the rights to sports increases the cost for those that
do not care about sports.

~~~
cookiecaper
ESPN is currently quite the quagmire for Disney corporate. Surprisingly, it's
the business unit that makes up the largest amount of Disney's revenue, around
30%. [1] The last several posted losses for Disney (including the one just
reported this month) have been primarily due to decreasing subscriber counts
for ESPN.

ESPN royalties are ~$7 per subscriber; $7 of your monthly cable bill goes to
Disney _just_ for ESPN [2]. They are obviously collecting that from many
people who are uninterested in sports, as most basic cable packages include
ESPN (if not ESPN 2 and so forth).

Cord cutting is the single biggest threat to Disney right now, and I'm sure
this, a major signal that people are excited to consume their sports via the
web and that ESPN is inching closer and closer to death, has them crapping
their pants.

When Amazon buys Disney World, will they replace Cinderella Castle with a
giant cardboard box bearing the "Amazon Prime" tape? ;)

[1 (PDF)] [https://ditm-twdc-
us.storage.googleapis.com/q1-fy17-earnings...](https://ditm-twdc-
us.storage.googleapis.com/q1-fy17-earnings.pdf)

[2] [http://awfulannouncing.com/2016/espns-rising-cable-fee-is-
no...](http://awfulannouncing.com/2016/espns-rising-cable-fee-is-now-up-to-
over-7-per-subscriber-per-month.html)

~~~
martinald
I'm actually surprised how cheap ESPN is. In the UK, adding the two main
sports networks (Sky and BT) adds something like $70/month, maybe more, to
your bill. It's definitely not included in "basic" packages but i bet millions
of people still subscribe to both. It's pretty much the only reason people
have payTV, and something like 60% of households do have payTV as a whole.

~~~
nikcub
You need five channels to get the equivalent of what BT and Sky provide with
the Premier League, and you are absolutely bombarded with advertising.
European football isn't really suitable to the same business model, so we have
to pay for our sports.

------
jonathankoren
I never understood Twitter's TNF streaming. I couldn't watch it on the phone,
and when I tried the website, I saw a small video (no audio) of the game, with
live tweets. I was genuinely confused and turned off by the experience. I
wanted to watch the game, just like I would have on television, but instead I
got this neither fish nor fowl experience, that was the worst of both.

Twitter should have never gotten the contract at all, because they don't have
a video client that runs on my television. Facebook doesn't either, and that's
why Facebook shouldn't have gotten it either.

Watching video in a browser is lame when I have 55 inch display literally feet
away. I want my content there. That's where I watch OTA television, Netflix,
and Hulu. If you can't provide it to my television, you've failed. (Yeah, you
can hook your computer up to your screen via HDMI, but it's janky as hell, and
a horrible experience. It's the 21st century equivalent of taping a magnifying
glass to your television and calling it a "big screen"
[http://www.tvhistory.tv/TV-Magnifying-Lens.JPG](http://www.tvhistory.tv/TV-
Magnifying-Lens.JPG))

~~~
virusduck
All the twitter games were simulcast on CBS... Not sure what the point of
having them on Twitter was...

~~~
jonathankoren
Probably an attempt to court young people and cord cutters.

Some people don't seem to know that many of the popular channels come free and
over the air like radio.

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tiff_seattle
Hopefully they will be broadcasting in 4K. It could be an influential driver
of people with 4K TV's to try out Amazon Prime.

~~~
paulcole
I'd bet the has 4K TV and doesn't have Amazon Prime segment to be pretty
small.

~~~
paulddraper
Probably.

Vizio's TVs are pretty much all Smartcast (Chromecast) now. Chromecast doesn't
work with Amazon Video, which is the main reason I don't watch it despite
having Prime.

~~~
mustacheemperor
Semantic correction, but it's really Amazon who refuses to let their streaming
garden exit their hardware garden. I'd say it's more that Amazon Video doesn't
work with the Chromecast. Since, you know, that's driving a lot of Fire Stick
purchases (fellow frustrated Chromecast and Prime owner here).

~~~
echelon
This is the reason I don't watch Amazon Prime video. It's so dumb to have to
have a separate device for everything.

~~~
wtvanhest
I bought a roku. Plays both amazon and netflix perfectly with a great
interface.

~~~
Cyph0n
I'm planning on buying a Fire TV stick. Plugs into your TV like the
Chromecast, and plays Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, HBO, etc.

------
seibelj
I just want to watch local games on my HD antenna. Being locked out of a
Patriots MNF game, forcing me to either go to a bar or watch an illegal
stream, is simply absurd.

~~~
aanm1988
Why is this absurd? It's expecting you to pay for their product.

~~~
bjorn2404
Don't forget that many of the stadiums are at least partially funded by taxes.

~~~
gregshap
The patriots stadium construction was owner funded.

"After the Hartford proposal fell through, Robert Kraft paid for 100% of the
construction costs, a rare instance of an NFL owner privately financing the
construction of a stadium."

[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gillette_Stadium](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gillette_Stadium)]

~~~
Retric
_Concurrently announced was a new road to access the stadium from U.S. Route
1_ so not quite.

~~~
SnowingXIV
That doesn't mean the city paid for it. If you start a new land development to
put up houses, you often cover all the costs associated with putting in roads
and signs. Not saying that's what happened here but one sentence saying a road
was put up doesn't indicate paid for by taxes.

------
puranjay
So Amazon seems to be competing pretty hard for my streaming dollars.

I subscribe to Netflix and I buy a HBO Go subscription when GoT comes around
(and cancel it right afterwards)

Given the good things I've heard about a few of Amazon's shows (the Man in the
High Castle for instance), I'm tempted to give it a try.

But I'm not going to pay for two streaming services at the same time. I just
don't stream enough to make it a feasible choice.

I reckon this is a good problem to have. Lower costs for me, and higher
content quality

~~~
qqg3
Amazon is the better deal if you only go for one, their content library has
gotten better and better.

Also, consider the other perks you get with Amazon, shipping, music, books etc

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thesehands
No question they have the infrastructure to do this well. I was impressed with
the quality that Yahoo managed when they streamed some live games last season
- perfect clarity with zero buffering and very little choppiness to the stream
that some other providers don't always manage.

~~~
tootie
I use Prime video extensively and it works great, but I've not seen them
attempt a live stream. I actually don't know how big a technical challenge it
is compared to static streaming.

~~~
huac
Amazon owns Twitch so I'd say they have some experience with that

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sremani
YouTube is my overwhelming choice, you want to be on a platform that is in
some form substituting TV. Twitter, FBLive, Amazon, AppleTV, XboxLive etc. are
all nice but are sideshows.

YouTube and Netflix are the only two real games in town, but YouTube is the
overwhelming front-runner.

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douche
Thursday games are usually the worst, so I'm not sure what kind of a coup this
is. Really, the NFL needs to bag the whole idea of Thursday games

~~~
kbouck
Agreed. TNF doesn't allow teams enough time for preparation and physical
recovery from the previous week's game. Especially when the previous game
takes place on Sunday or Monday night.

The Redskins had a stretch this past season where they had to play MNF on
11/21, and then TNF on 11/24 -- only 2 full days in between. That scheduling
was absurd.

~~~
fletchowns
Is it really that big of a deal if that happens once in awhile? I'm probably
opening a huge can of worms with this comparison, but NHL players play 3-4
games a week all the time. Granted, both sports are tough as hell on the
players.

~~~
kunaalarya
Football is much more tough than hockey and needs recovery time. Hockey is
tough but Football you have running backs/WRs getting hit on every other play.
You have the QB getting knocked down 3-5 times a game. The the offensive line
is having a pushing and hand war with the defensive line on every single play
while playing strategically and covering additional players. The WRs have to
sprint on every play. And for special teams you have the opposite team running
at you as you run at them.

------
amelius
When will VR sports streaming become a thing?

I want to watch a match virtually from within the stadium.

~~~
Touche
Steve Ballmer talked about this recently on a podcast, and said that they are
working on it. It would allow you to buy a "virtual ticket" for any seat in
the building.

I think it's a pretty great idea for fans who live far away from their
favorite teams.

~~~
ghaff
Sporting events (and experiences like concerts more broadly) seem like one of
those areas where VR could actually find paying customers. There's a proven
market for subscribing to watch this sort of activity and it avoids the
physical interaction/feedback challenges that a lot of other VR applications
have.

The tech still needs to get better and there are certainly questions of viewer
fatigue etc. But it certainly seems like a very plausible use of VR.

~~~
kunaalarya
i don't get this. You get a better view of the game on tv (multi-angles,
commentary, etc.). You go to arenas for the experience, of getting there
beforehand, tailgating, going with your friends/kids. You get a worse view but
you get a better experience. Why would you use VR for a worse view without the
experience?

~~~
Touche
As a baseball fan who doesn't live in a city with a team, I would definitely
use this. You're right that you don't get the full experience with VR, but I
disagree that the view isn't _part_ of the experience. So if the choice is no
experience, only TV viewing, or some little bit of it, I'll take VR. Not every
time I watch, of course, but every once in a while, definitely.

EDIT: I just realized that you're probably focused on football. Football isn't
a great live sport for viewing, so I get where you are coming from there. The
pregame experience (tailgating) is the biggest reason to go to a football
game. I've done plenty of tailgating where we never go into the game at all.

For other sports I think this makes more sense.

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sumoboy
Only need to signup 500k people to break even.

------
Neliquat
So cable and all its burdens is just followimg the cordcutters. Please amazon,
let the sportsball fools pay their own way. I cut cable partly to avoid paying
the sports tax.

------
syshum
>Amazon has wanted to put sports rights on its Amazon Prime video service,

Amazon wants me to cancel my Prime Video Service....

I would have rather gotten Season 3-n of Alpha House than Football or any
other sports.. If they start investing in sports over premium content they can
count me out...

I have been a prime member almost from the beginning of prime, I own 6 fireTV
devices, and a few Kindle's, I am deep in the Amazon eco system, I will rip
them all out over sports..

I dropped cable TV originally because I grew tried of most of my payment going
to subsidize sports, and having my channels interrupted with "Live Sports"

~~~
Godel_unicode
So if they pocketed the $50 million or did share buybacks or similar you'd be
ok, but you have an ideological problem with sports and will cancel over them?

~~~
mynameishere
He's probably concerned that going forward a certain large percentage of his
"Prime" subscription will go toward sports, just like cable:

[https://consumerist.com/2014/08/05/espn-accounts-for-more-
th...](https://consumerist.com/2014/08/05/espn-accounts-for-more-than-6-of-
your-cable-bill-could-soon-top-8/)

...I doubt Amazon will get that bad, but it's definitely a good reason to
currently avoid cable. Really, for people who don't like sports, the notion
that watching people throw a ball around costs vastly more than the other
channels is baffling. I really don't want some heavyweight imbeciles getting
my money when I want to watch news/movies/comedy/etc.

~~~
Godel_unicode
This just seems like such a strange attitude, given the veritable ocean of
non-sports content out there at the moment. If your show got cancelled, it's
almost certainly not because of sports; rather, it's exceedingly likely that
it's up against some other show (or shows) which drew a larger audience.

In fact, realize that up until very recently a great deal of non-sports
content only got created because sports were used as leverage against the
cable companies. The bundling that happened on major cable networks required
cable companies to carry channels which comparatively few people watch in
order for the cable company to be allowed to carry e.g. ESPN. If you're a fan
of indie content/comedy, you should be happy about the existence of ESPN et
al, otherwise your show would likely not exist.

