@Paolo_X has been hammering away at this one for quite some time now. This is not going to stop anytime soon. It is interesting that people sign up for the NFL or other content and when that content is done - they bail and come back next year.
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I’m cross-linking this here because the gambling issue with regards to integrity of play is basically now amongst the top issues for any major sports league.
For all the fancy and imaginative talk about expansion and the like, for what is already on the plate, sports betting opportunities and mounting concerns fall right in with the rest of the top business issues for the major leagues.
In the US as I heard recently via a report from Bloomberg that was quite sanitized and in my view also misinformative because it was a disguised informercial and a puff piece, the handle for sports betting is in the following order:
- NFL
- NBA
- MLB
- NCAA Football
September, October, January, the Super Bowl, March Madness (NCAA basketball is otherwise way down the list), and the NBA Playoffs have always been the prime times.
In addition to in August during ironically back-to-school, these months are also when it seems to me that we see far more advertising for sports betting beyond the already obnoxious presence in many sports studios and gambling ads during big screen viewing in general.
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And the losing Plaintiffs have in turn appealed after the NFL was granted its request to have the verdict overturned, so now the case goes to he next level of federal court in San Francisco.
This matter should drag on for years at this rate, as Mike Florio explains here, unless by chance the parties should decide to sit down and settle the matter, which I don’t see the NFL ever doing.
The amount of the verdict, and the requirement that it be tripled under the antitrust laws, guarantees that the case will be appealed and appealed and appealed until all appeals are exhausted. If it’s ultimately sent back to the trial court for further proceedings (including potentially a new trial or a trial on damages only), a different judge will handle the case.
American justice and all that.
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For the sake of scheduling of live sports on “regular TV” versus streaming, what a contrast to 2021 through 2023 when the industry attempted in great vain to push more prime content onto streaming. The stronger case for streaming for live sports has long been over since about March 2023, which I called “Peak Streaming” in this thread.
Streaming exclusive live content for live sports, akin to a podcast but with different audiences, is not and never has been optimal for live sports, though streaming does serve its valuable function as a simulcast.
Now Amazon might want to have a word with us in those regards, but nobody else in the US has Amazon’s untold and unknown sums and proprietary technology dedicated into streaming the NFL at the highest-quality level.
Now Comcast will continue to play those Peacock games of trying to entice and compel people to subscribe at bargain rates yet still somehow magically keep regular cable TV,
but compared to 2020 when Comcast tried to force the issue even for paying cable customers back then before the wave of cutting ALL the cords,
it appears that most scheduling of major live sports in the industry has settled into a pattern with a heavy preference for regular TV via over-the-air and cable channel in that order.
And there’s this fine take on the future of Venu and on sports and entertainment in general, which is likely going to be going away for good now like some of those regional sports networks, after Fubo won a preliminary injunction against Venu in federal court.
Please note that I am no fan of Dan LeBatard now also on Draftkings Network, who is quite high on himself in this clip and who does not compare to other sports-oriented programming after his days at ESPN, when he was overrated anyway and quite frankly as I had believed, propped up like overwhelmingly most of the ESPN talent of yore with a few still hanging on now.
Even so, LeBatard has a great commentator in David Samson on his show often.
I recommend this clip for the first seven minutes before they get into their stupid inside jokes about their own show as if still in FM radio, which was annoying already by 2010 on any given channel or radio station.
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This ruling against Apple in the EU could put a serious snarl into its plans to invest more in new and non-core businesses, such as Apple TV+.
The European Commission scored a surprise win against Apple that confirmed its €13 billion back-tax bill for one of the world’s richest companies.
The Court of Justice tossed out a lower court judgment that reversed the Commission’s decision that Apple’s tax arrangements with Ireland were illegal.
“Ireland granted Apple unlawful aid which Ireland is required to recover,” the Court of Justice said on Tuesday. It stressed that its ruling was the “final judgment in the matter.”
Simply reading that summary of the damage sounds as if extremely painful, and other technology firms using the Irish or Luxembourgish tax codes to their advantage, yet selling associated intellectual property as via the app stores all over the EU, will also be impacted very soon.
Captain Obvious:
Because the NFL is King of All Media in the US …
…gaining the NFL’s residential out-of-market rights has been a significant driver to the overall YouTube business. YouTube TV is now the No. 4 U.S. pay-TV service, with more than eight million subscribers. By 2026, YouTube TV is projected to rise to No. 1 status, according to prominent research firm MoffettNathanson, as it continues to grow while the three linear carriers in front of it—Charter, Comcast, and DirecTV—are all in a state of decline.
Recently the owner of my barber shop switched to YouTube TV from cable, then one cousin, and now he’s encouraging his parents including his dad another cousin.
None of these were early adopters of YouTube TV, but one can see what cable TV is NOT doing for people even three years after All Cord-Cutting Wave
(cable TV AND cable internet) when you randomly hear such news.
YouTube is killing it especially for recorded content.
Scripps Sports knew what they were doing with the WNBA in their investments into live sports starting in 2023, taking a page out of the CW to enter the space with cable channels on the wane:
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Here’s a salient post about the CTV situation in Canada here that on a broader basis would also offer insight on those still with cable subscriptions.
Such an audience has been a declining pool of viewers and subscribers in most areas without inexpensive cable TV,
and now generally of retirement age,
who perhaps must have certain shows to watch that are still only on cable,
which has been a lower and lower number of shows each year since about 2015, before which Netflix in December 2013 began its deal for an exclusive for “Better Call Saul” in one of the early developments for what is now the dominant trend for new shows whether or not also aired over-the-air.
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Oh look, Cox cable in the US has been doing what Google and Apple and other Big Tech have been doing for years with customer “consent” - what a shocker!
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AI Censorship of YouTube - Ban First, Wait for Questions Later
I’m seeing this more and more lately on YouTube when apparently they are striking first via AI and only after-the-fact, after videos are taken down and/or channel demonetized, waiting for the channel owner to object so that a human being can re-examine the situation for usually some common sense to prevail.
You’ll run into a number of videos in which people are complaining on this front, and some are often rightful suspects with sour grapes for crossing the wrong lines in my view, but many are absolutely innocent caught in a sinister web of AI.
Now from a ruthless business standpoint and given a whole lot of crap on YouTube, I can understand that part of the strategy.
But they are clearly punishing the good students in the room well beyond the few bad ones.
Such is the price of hitching your business to a company like Google though.
From what I hear from more YouTube creators with channels than ever, YouTube sounds akin to a spiteful neighbourhood cat the way they treat more and more people.
The Google people are an arrogant lot as well, but hey they are being taken to task more and more now to the tune of billions in fines especially in the European Union, so it’s not surprising any more to encounter such issues or see videos taken down beyond considerations associated with far more obvious and serious violations of terms of use such as copyright violations, clearly pornographic content, advocacy for physical violence, undisclosed use of AI for generation of content, et cetera.
Picking Up The Pieces Leftover From The Failed Regional Sports Network Racket
Scripps Sports and Amazon are heavily at it now.
Fans in some markets can get ready for a new subscription, if not already at hand, should Amazon win the associated local rights in those markets.
That’s still better than the vastly overpriced cable bill at hand circa 2021 in those markets, plus of course once the season is done, one can simply cancel.
Pretty much on point here. The introductory offer doesn’t help much either. People feel victimized once those run out and the constant switching between providers to pit them against themselves to get the introductory offer grows tiresome for most. This also feels like a bit of cutting off your nose to spite your face amongst the providers.
I would go OTA if provided with more options, but settling for Disney+, Amazon, TSN, and a myriad of free streaming like CBC, Pluto, Youtube, hoopla (library enabled) and Kanopy (library enabled) seems enough for me.
Those 3 services are still cheaper than any annual cable subscription. Around $400/year vs god knows what…
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Check out how this was written and the failed thinking that prevailed in the ivory towers and greed chambers in entertainment media:
In 2021, MoffettNathanson Research predicted that number of homes with pay TV service would drop to 73.2 million in 2024. Three years later, pay TV subscriptions have sailed past that milestone, reaching 68.76 million households at the end of Q2. While MoffettNathanson once estimated that 53 million homes would represent “the bedrock floor of the pay TV world,” the firm now says the pit is bottomless.
**> **
> “It is becoming increasingly clear that there is no longer any floor,” analyst Craig Moffitt wrote in a recent research report.
What a bunch of arrogant bojacks were these people! There NEVER is a floor in anything associated with humanity unless there were total destruction of life as we know it on the planet such as in prehistoric times and regionally based on various calamities.
Even worse is that the signals of dissatisfaction of customers were abundant, loud, and clear. Customers were clamoring for years for better access to ONLY key channels and stressed by the recession brought on by the pandemic yet being served a steady diet of even worse shows.
During the pandemic even with a rare CAPTIVE AUDIENCE, the industry did not adapt at all off the screen and as far as on screen, oh well we have already forgotten how it was to watch TV with people wearing masks much of the time even when outdoors without anybody near them!
So thinking they’ve made some discovery of a bottomless pit as most of their subscribers have seen all along, hopefully others in the industry will get a belated clue like Moffitt or at this point, they can just go to hell faster already.
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Here’s another key quote from the article that basically sums up the dominantly failed business proposition of streaming but for temporary subscriptions for access to LIVE sports, not people talking about sports incessantly, since about 2021, though Tubi’s greatest success [owned by Fox] is only here in 2024.
As I have noted previously, the height of arrogance by the industry is that magically they could just keep raising cable rates, EVEN in a recession during the pandemic, and then people would be fine with paying “only $5 per month” for more access to live sports or certain niche content. Uh no, and the common response was “SCREW YOU” with more than not ever going back to any of that nonsense or to offerings by the cable companies at all. They screwed themselves.
According to MoffettNathanson, only one out of four households subscribes to a live TV streaming plan after cutting traditional TV service. The rest stick with cheaper services like Netflix, free services like YouTube and Tubi, or a plain old antenna.
That would be like me now in the 3 out of 4 viewers.
More of the rest of the 1 out of 4 not still on cable are with YouTube TV, which to me is essentially half-price cable TV on streaming at $73 per month and likely going up soon (but they do allow up to 6 accounts per subscription, which for a large family or group can make great sense).
What the industry is missing though is that most people didn’t like the typical cable TV channel line-up before they cut the cord anyway. People only watched a few of those hundreds of channels anyway.
Even on any given new TV with a built-in platform like Google TV, it’s easier to have all the apps up front with already more than one can watch given all that is free.
Akin to as @BomberJunkie stated, YouTube is free, Tubi is free, Pluto TV is free, et cetera and add a few cheap or promotional apps and you have far more than you can possibly watch and earn a living for even less than $15 per month.
I personally pay for only Paramount+ on the annual prepay at $63, which will likely increase though probably be augmented with far more content via new ownership, and get Netflix included in my mobile and internet plan, which is common any more.
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[Netflix] Untold: [FBI] Operation Flagrant Foul
I’m late to the party on this documentary, released in 2022, and wow, the NBA situation with the gambling scandal of Tim Donaghy was indeed WORSE than I thought and definitely was not reported widely to any degree.
The NBA had to know and orchestrate much of what was going on though like Donaghy, they did not interface directly with organized crime, which is discussed in the documentary.
From what I have seen, Donaghy was certainly guilty but also was made out to be the patsy for what was a far larger conspiracy courtesy of one of the biggest asshats ever as a pro sports executive, David Stern, the same Napoelonic asshats who mind you who unilaterally changed the actual basketball despite plenty of player feedback against it only a few seasons later, only to finally EAT CROW and change it back midseason.
I HIGHLY recommend this documentary, and as I became less interested in the NBA after 2010 when my Lakers then won the title having my suspicions back then. I’m sticking to my suspicions well at hand during all of this Lebron Era as well, especially after “The Decision” when it was clear a power-move was being made beyond the court.
Ironically the end days of the referee gambling scandal in the NBA, which was even broader as you will see, were in early 2007 including during February 2007 when the NBA All-Star Game was held for the first time in Las Vegas.
I was living in Las Vegas at the time, and the local impression of the NBA after that weekend was not good at all, but now I can see how the NBA had to be distanced from Las Vegas given the fallout of this matter as well.