Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Media & Entertainment Law Blogs -> Sports Biz

Media & Entertainment Law

: Sports Biz

NBA Considers Local Streaming of Games

The NBA is considering taking live video streaming of games where no league has gone before. It is currently negotiating a plan to allow live streaming of local games within a local market, so you could watch, say, a Celtics game on Celtics.com or on nesn.com. It is a plan sure to anger the satellite broadcasters and cable companies.

Because of the unusual and complex nature of the negotiations, and the ramifications with the satellite and cable companies, the teams have authorized the league to conduct all of the negotiations to put this plan for the 2008-09 season. It is a monumental task to get it done that quickly, especially since not all teams control their own local digital rights. The local regional sports networks control the digital rights in some markets. Of course, in some markets, the RSN is controlled by, or at least partially owned by, the NBA team, making that part of the negotiation a bit easier. The hard part remains mollifying the cable and satellite companies who are going to be naturally afraid of losing market share to the new technology. Direct TV is likely the biggest loser, as the cable companies are the most likely broadband operators benefiting from the online offering. Direct TV does not yet have a broadband offering of its own.

Local streaming wold take the NBA a step farther in digital offerings then either MLB or the NFL has gone. MLB streams all out of market games and has been making a good deal of money doing so. The NFL has just recently announced its first offering, which will be streaming the Sunday night NBC game. The NBA has not yet decided whether to charge for streaming and will probably leave that decision to each individual club.

Full post as published by Sports Biz on August 18, 2008 (boomark / email).