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NBC Launches Olympics Site, Pledges to ‘Stream Everything’ Online

April 18, 2012 by

Call it the fully online Olympics: In a news release today NBC said it would put as many events as possible from this year’s Summer Olympics online, often live as they happen from London. “If cameras are on it, we’ll stream it,” said Rick Cordella, vice president and general manager of NBC Sports Digital Media, in a report from the New York Times. The content will be offered free at NBCOlympics.com, a new site which launched Wednesday with the games 100 days away.

With digital viewing of live sports on the increase everywhere, it’s no surprise that NBC is going to show as much of the Olympics as it can. With high-profile partners like Cisco and AT&T helping flesh out the technical infrastructure, NBC should be well prepared for the expected online onslaught. Like the Masters and other events occuring over long periods of time at non-U.S. prime time hours, the Olympics are tailor-made for asynchronous viewing on mobile platforms. You could even say that the Olympics are the perfect event for online, on-demand viewing since many of the sports aren’t mainstream but have devoted followers who for years had to go through bizarre hoops just to find coverage of their beloved events, like curling or equestrian.

And it’s a good bet that people who watch an event live on a mobile platform will return later that day or the next day to watch a produced version of the event on the regular TV shows; so far all stats for online viewerships show that having more content online only increases the regular broadcast audience of an event.

Filed Under: Live sports via mobile, Live Sports Video Consumption, NBC Sports, Olympics Tagged With: ,

Will Google’s Android Issues Benefit Windows 8?

April 18, 2012 by

The just started Oracle vs Google legal battle has been billed by one observer as “The World Series” of IP lawsuits and while I know that many do not pay much attention to the legal battles between tech giants, this one could have a very direct impact on any user of an Android device and possible app developers as well. On the flip side other rivals may prosper.

The reason goes to the crux of the lawsuit, which claims that Google knowingly and willingly used a variety of patents and technologies that belong to Oracle, all of the them related to the Java language that it purchased from Sun.

So far the trial, which is being covered pretty closely by many in the tech world due to its potential major impact on Android, has been very interesting. With what looks to be damming internal e-mails from inside Google hurting its chances to Oracle’s CEO Larry Ellison admitting that he does not know if the charge for Java helping Google, I am sure it will continue to be interesting. In some cases Java is free while in others a license is required. Who is correct? Who knows?

Oracle wants billions in damages and Google is simply seeking to not get a permanent injunction against its using the technology in question. That could shut down Android for a while as they either work out a deal or Google develops a work around. This would have the potential to killing, in the near term, Android tablet developers that are still trying to establish themselves and on the flip side has the potential to be a major boost for Microsoft and its partner son the Windows Phone side, so stay tuned.

Filed Under: Android, Apps, Google, Lawsuit, Microsoft Tagged With: , , ,

The Atlanta Hawks Social Hub- Where Fans Gather

April 18, 2012 by

With the NBA playoffs just around the corner here is wishing that your team is angling for a better seeding for the games rather than for the lottery. While looking around the league I was struck by how easy it was to use the Hawks Social Hub, a nice mixture of new and older technologies.

Right next to the banner headline of ‘Hawks Social Hub’ are six icons for popular news and social media feeds such as YouTube and Twitter, but really that is just a tease. Directly below are two large boxes, one with the latest Facebook posting and a link to Facebook, as well as a invite to join a contest to win 4 free tickets.

Across is a box with the Twitter feed, and you can follow the team at @atlanta_hawks and the site touts that you can follow all of the Hawks social media at one place, here at the Hub. Beneath this box are three slightly smaller boxes.

The first is a link that takes you to the teams YouTube channel for videos. The second is the teams official blog, with one of the current conversations discussing its playoff picture while the third box covers its Google + feed.

Below all of this are two buttons, one for users that wish to see additional video and the other is for those who like to comment on message boards. This is just the front page of the Hub. It has pages for fans looking to buy team merchandise, get stats, buy tickets, look at cheerleaders and more.

The sponsors for the page are quite clear as well, showing that the team understands how to partner with advertisers. The Georgia Lottery is the page’s sponsor and others can be found on the page, but not really to a point where they are obtrusive.

This is a great example of how a good page, incorporating all of the different forms of social media can really make it easier for fans to follow their teams. For any traveler that has been in a city far from home waiting patiently while the local sports channel or ESPN to finish scrolling through all of the games that you are not interested in to get to the one that you do care about, now there is a much more efficient method of catching up.

Team pages vary a great deal, which in one way is good, it enables them to highlight what they believe their fans are most interested in. On the other hand it can make finding the information of connection you want difficult to find. Just head over to a different teams page and try finding Google + or YouTube videos. On some they are not present and others very difficult to find.

Filed Under: Atlanta Hawks, Facebook, Google, NBA, Social Media, Social Media Data, Sports Social Media, Twitter, YouTube Tagged With: , , , ,

No Surprise: PGA Sees Huge Leap in Online Video Consumption

April 17, 2012 by

Here at Mobile Sports Report we know that many of you like to watch golf online. We know that because basically anything we write about where to watch golf gets good traffic. Now the PGA has provided some facts to back up our observations: According to the PGA, viewership of its Live@ online live golf action coverage is up more than 100 percent compared to 2011, part of an overall traffic surge to the PGATour.com site.

Mobile app activity is also up by a triple-digit margin, thanks to the PGA’s excellent Android, iPhone and iPad apps. Some highlights from the press release:

• An all-time record quarter with more than 5.8 million average monthly unique users, up 40 percent vs. 2011.
• March 2012 set an all-time record with 7.5 million monthly unique users, an increase of 62 percent vs. March 2011.
• An increase of 105 percent for video consumption over last year.
• PGA TOUR mobile products have also seen triple digit growth (139 percent over last year).

Now what we need to see from the PGA is a more thorough and comprehensive online strategy — currently the tour only broadcasts select tournaments online — perhaps embracing the wonderful online coverage from the Masters and making that the PGA standard. An online fan can only hope.

Filed Under: Android, Apple, Apps, Golf, iPad, iPhone, Live sports via mobile, PGA, Tablets, The Masters Tagged With: , ,

Did you know MLB has an App Game that Could Enable You to Win $5.6 Million?

April 17, 2012 by

A few weeks ago we looked at a number of apps that Major League Baseball has made available to fans, including the ever popular MLB.com AT Bat 12 as well as the recently released At the Ballpark, both of which have been very well received.

What I missed was the app Full Count that delivers streaming content and the fact that the game that fans can participate in to try and break Joe DiMaggio’s all-time consecutive hit streak is not only an app but has a $5.6 million prize, so a short comment on both is worthwhile.

Full Count is an app that was developed in conjunction with Yahoo! Sports and it provides a range of features including up to the minute player and team stats, scores, live look-ins at key plays and in-game progress video highlights.

A user can pause a video and rewind it if they so desire and they can follow an embedded twitter feed that includes ones from analysts, commentators and MLB.com insiders. The program is free and can be accessed on iPads, iPhones and on PCs. This looks to me like the second best thing to watching a game at work.

The second app is called MLB.com Beat the Streak presented by Scotts and it involves an effort by fans to participate, but that have the potential to win a $5.6 million grand prize. To play you pick one or two players from a list supplied by MLB on a daily basis. If your player gets a hit on the first day you have the start of a streak. You keep on selecting for as many days as your players keep you in the game, if you have a day with no hits you are set back to zero, but can start again.

There is no limit to how many times you select any individual player, and you can make selections up to 10 days in advance, a boon to those with weekend duties or travel obligations. The contest ends with the end of the 2012 regular season. The first to reach 57 consecutive games wins.

To play you need to register at www.mlb.com/bts or www.mlb.com/fantasy and then download the app, which is currently for iPhones, iPod Touch and iPads only.

This strikes me as a great way to keep fans not only engaged but actively following all players to ensure that they have a hot hand and pay attention to what pitchers their selected hitters will be facing.

Filed Under: Apple, Apps, Athlete to Follow, Baseball, Contests, Fantasy Sports, Live sports via mobile, Live Sports Video Consumption, Major League Baseball, Smartphone, Twitter, Yahoo Tagged With: ,

Sponsor Post: Can Fiksu Help You Promote your App?

April 17, 2012 by

Congratulations — you have built a mobile app, and are ready to stake your claim to your share of the exploding app marketplace. But maybe getting noticed isn’t as easy as you thought it would be, and you’re having a hard time getting potential customers to find your product in the sea of apps.

Lost at what to do? Try starting with some good advice from the folks at Fiksu, who have put together a free white paper titled Best Practices for Growing your Mobile App Business. Though we don’t have a mobile app here at MSR (yet) I did read through the paper and found it does a great job of explaning how to optimize your app-finding strategies. In the end, you might want to contact the Fiksu folks to see if their Fiksu platform technology can help you improve your app-promotion cost/performance curve, and get more loyal followers and customers. The contact info is at the end of the white paper, which you can download here. For the price of an email address, that’s a first choice that’s easy on any budget.

Fiksu is a sponsor of Mobile Sports Report.

Filed Under: Apps Tagged With: ,
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