NBC slows live streaming coverage of the 2010 Winter Olympics

8Feb/102

Perkins Miller, senior VP of digital media for NBC Sports & Olympics, acknowledges that the television product remains the core business. “If you look at the way the folks in the corner office have programmed the Olympics for decades, and done so with tremendous success, what it reflects is that people want to watch the Olympics while sitting in front of their 50-inch television when it is most convenient for them,” he says. “This is something we continue to support strategically.”

If this article is accurate, NBC may be greatly reducing their live streaming coverage of the 2010 Winter Olympics. In 2008, NBC live streamed over 2,200 hours of live coverage of the Beijing Summer Olympics.

I wonder if that much live streaming had more to do with the time difference between China and the United States than an actual interest in developing the Internet streaming market. Perhaps NBC figured that viewers would be searching the Internet for event results anyway, so NBC might as well create the most compelling Olympics site possible.

In 2010, the Winter Olympics are in Vancouver, so there is not as much of a time zone concern. The good news is that most of the events will be online, both in highlight and complete form, but only after the event has aired.

To be fair, businesses have to look after the most profitable interests first. TV programming and advertising still brings in the most revenue. It simply doesn't make sense for the major networks to create revenue streams that take away from their main interest: TV programming.

Action Item

Comment below. What do you think about NBC's reduction of live streaming events? Do you think that streaming the events after the live broadcast is a good compromise?

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Comments (2) Trackbacks (0) ( subscribe to comments on this post )

Charles Sizemore
February 9th, 2010 - 10:10

I wondered how long the networks would supply content to services like Hulu and to their own streaming sites given that this cannibalizes their current business model. But now that they have started streaming their content, it’s hard to stop without alienating fans. It will be really interesting to see how this all plays out. Eventually, (and by this I mean in less than 5 years) I think the Netflix on-demand model will dominate. It will be interesting to see how the industry gets there though and how they intend to make money!
Ronald
February 9th, 2010 - 10:49

I like this Mark Cuban counterpoint regarding Internet television (LINK HERE). Basically, he says that the current Internet infrastructure could never support streaming to a very large audience. He also says that, right now, it’s actually cheaper to pay the cable or satellite providers to create a channel for you.

This presents an interesting point. I’ve always heard tech pundits talk about how much “dark fiber” (unused infrastructure) is out there. Do any of you know if this dark fiber actually exists, and if it does, now much of it is out there?