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Friday Grab Bag — Jocks Twittering Guide Issue

November 11, 2011 by

No M&M’s in NASCAR
Kyle Busch will be forced to race in the last two Sprint Cup races without his primary sponsor as M&M’s pulls out. This is more of the aftermath of his cheap shot of intentionally wrecking Ron Hornaday Jr. in the Truck Series two weeks ago. Busch was suspended from racing in the Sprint Cup last week and fined $50,000 by NASCAR. I had always thought that NASCAR encouraged this type of driving, who knew?


Twitter offers advice to Athletes on how to use Twitter
Twitter, which clearly understands how interesting athletes can be on Twitter, has issued an advisory for them on its developer site. The social media company tells them to talk about what they are passionate about, use hash tags, reply back to followers and mention your team mates among other tidbits of sage advice. Also it tells them that if something controversial happens on the field Twitter can help clear the air- no mention that it can also shorten a career, or is that just my take?

Apple releases iOS 5.01 battery fix
Apple has responded to complaints that the latest release of its iOS operating system, iOS 5.0, unnaturally drains batteries of iPhones. The company has released iOS 5.0.1 that has been designed to fix that issue as well as including several other bug fixes for both the phone and the iPad including document syncing via iCloud and improved voice recognition for Australian users.

Will ESPN’s Longhorn Network force a College Playoff?
An Interesting piece from Businessweek discusses how the $300 million, 20 year deal between the University of Texas and the Walt Disney Co. (parent to ESPN for those that are still unaware) was a major tipping point in collegiate athletics. The move led to the huge rash of conference realignments and movements as everybody tries to position themselves to get as much of the money that is on the table for themselves and tradition be damned. I think this line from the article says it all- “It’s greed,” said William E. Kirwan, chancellor of the University of Maryland system and co-chairman of the nonprofit Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics. “There is so much money on the table that everyone is in a state of panic.”


This week in Lawsuit News
The patent wars continue unabated, which always makes for interesting watching as long as you are not personally at risk. First up is Microsoft which apparently has another target in its royalties pursuit, this time it has its eye on Huawei for Android patent license. Then there is the report that Google will be offering support to Android firms involved in lawsuits. Last but not least is the news that Apple continues Steve Jobs legal pursuit of Android developers for what it perceives as patent violations of its technology. Is this a great time to be a patent lawyer or what?

Major League Baseball to be Lockout Free?
The site MLBtraderumors.com covers a range of reports that indicate that MLB and the Players Union may be well on the road to reaching a new accord without the need for canceling the World Series or some other slap in the fans face. While the NBA is in lockout mode and the NFL just recovering from its labor war it is great news that at least one major league can work like adults well in advance of the expiration of the existing deal to forge a new one. I hope this does work out well.

Adobe throws in the towel on Mobile Flash
Adobe is facing the music and has announced that it will stop developing a version of its Flash technology for mobile devices. The technology has come under fire as Apple had banned its use in its iOS due to what it claimed was it did not meet the needs of a that space, a move that was later followed by Microsoft. At first Adobe fought back but now the company said it will turn its attention to HTML5 and will work with all of the major developers, Apple included, in that space.

From the “Just because it amuses me” Category
Nothing to do with sports, social media or technology but- Did you catch the photo in The Consumerist of a pig-shaped pork roast offered at Costco? Looks like it is ground and then molded pork scraps that are shaped like a baby piglet-somehow I am sure this will not make my dinner table anytime soon but who knows, it could make for a very interesting holiday gift!

Filed Under: Android, Apps, Athlete to Follow, Baseball, ESPN, iPhone, NASCAR, NCAA Football, NFL, Twitter Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Jersey Voters Overwhelmingly Support Sports Betting

November 9, 2011 by

LeRoy's Sports Book in Las Vegas has a mobile sports betting application ready to go if Federal laws are relaxed

New Jersey voters overwhelmingly supported sports betting at Atlantic City Casinos and state racetracks, paving the way for a legal challenge to Federal restrictions against legal sports betting on mobile devices.

According to a Philadelphia Media Network report, the ballot initiative passed by greater than a two-to-one ratio. Republican Gov. Chris Christie says the initiative provides him ammunition to challenge the Unlawful Gambling Enforcement Act, passed by Congress in 2006, which prohibits all states except those that already allowed sports wagering to implement sports betting systems.

“With this referendum, we have an opportunity that gives the state more solid footing to challenge the federal ban on sports wagering outside of a few select places,” Christie said before he voted in favor of Public Question 1, according to Philadelphia Media Network.

The move is significant because reform to the Unlawful Gambling Enforcement Act and The Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, passed by Congress in 1992, are needed in order to allow legal sports betting on mobile devices across the United States. Today, because of Federal law, an estimated $380 billion annually in illegal sports betting is conducted in the United States annually, according to National Gambling Impact Study Commission. Much of that is conducted through the online portals of offshore casinos, which are widely known to provide poor customer service and slow payouts.

New law would prove a boom for mobile device application developers. To date, Cantor Gaming, which operates the race and sports books of such Las Vegas casino powerhouses as the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, the Tropicana Las Vegas, the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas and The Palazzo, and American Wagering, which operates a chain of race and sports books called Leroy’s, have released sports wagering applications that work in the state of Nevada. In addition, leading sports social media application developer PlayUp USA has similar capabilities through sister companies in international markets. Numerous other mobile sports application developers are also preparing sports wagering applications.

Research firm Gartner Group estimated that global mobile gaming revenues reached $5.6 billion in 2010, and predicted the market would grow to $11.4 billion dollars by 2014.

Filed Under: Android, Apps, Cantor Gamin, Live sports via mobile, Mobile sports pioneers, Sports Betting Tagged With: , , , , ,

Monday’s Tech Tidbits: Motorola Edition

November 7, 2011 by

Motorola goes Xoom Xoom
Motorola has added two Xoom models to its tablet offerings. Both Xoom 2 models run Google’s Honeycomb 3.2 version of the Android operating system that is designed for tablets. The Xoom 2 features a 8.2-inch display and the Xoom 2 Media Edition comes with a 10.1 inch display and runs on a 1.2GHz processor and includes 1GB RAM and 16GB of storage. They are now only available in the United Kingdom and Ireland with no announced U.S. release date.

Smartphone adoption in US approaching 50%
According to the latest mobile user survey from Nielsen only 43% of all U.S. mobile phone users have a smartphone, but the figure graphs higher with most younger age groups. While the 12-17 and 45-54 segments only have a 40% smartphone average, 62% of the 25-34 age group and 54% of both the 18-24 and the 35-44 age groups use a smartphone. The Android OS is the most popular with 43% of the market followed by Apple’s iOS with 28%.

New Motorola Tablet prototype outed.
Multiple sources are reported what they claim are the features for the pending Motorola Corvair, a 6-inch tablet that will be running the Android 2.3 operating system. What sets this device apart is that it is designed to work with a television, both as a remote control device but also use the TV as a display to mirror what is on the tablet’s screen. It is expected to be a low cost device the question will be will Motorola sell it on the retail market or work with cable companies to get it into users’ hands?

Apple losing patent fights with Google, Samsung?
A German court has dealt a blow to Apple, ruling that it has violated a pair of Motorola Mobility patents and forbidding Apple from selling any mobile device in the country. The ruling, by the Mannheim Regional Court prevents Apple from selling its popular iPad and iPhone products in Europe’s largest market.. Apple is suing three major Android developers, Samsung, HTC and Motorola and they in turn have launched legal counter attacks against Apple.


US Cellular to iPhone-No Thanks!
US Cellular said that turned down the opportunity to carry Apple’s popular iPhone but decided not to because it is too expensive, the company said. The sixth-largest U.S. cellphone company said that the terms were unacceptable from a risk and profitability standpoint. While Apple charges customers $199 for the entry level iPhone 4S, it charges phone companies $600. The companies are expected to make up the difference on service contracts.
http://www.reghardware.com/2011/11/07/mobile_internet_sales_to_hit_record_15_per_cent_of_total/

Mobile Devices impacting online sales
It is estimated that a full 15% of all web purchases will be made from devices that run either the Apple iOS or the Google Android operating system. According to research from IBM the two operating systems impact is three times what it was a year ago in terms of being the platforms used to make purchases. The two represented 11% of the market in October and the estimate is for the holiday season in the U.S. market.

Filed Under: Android, Apps, iPad, iPhone, Motorola, Samsung, Tablets Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Verizon: MNF a ‘Big Draw’ for NFL Mobile App

November 7, 2011 by

The ability to watch Monday Night Football on your phone — like tonight’s game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Chicago Bears — has drawn a lot of new fans to Verizon Wireless’s NFL Mobile app, according to a company executive in charge of the service.

“The NFL Mobile app is very popular, and we continue to see growth [in user numbers],” said Mitch Dornich, Verizon Wireless marketing director for entertainment and sponsorships, in a phone interview. Though Dornich would not disclose updated subscriber numbers, last year Verizon reportedly had at least 4.5 million of its wireless customers using the NFL Mobile app — a number that has almost certainly grown thanks to the addition of live Monday Night Football games to the app’s premium-service tier this season.

“Last year, we had Thursday night games, Sunday night games, the NFL Network shows and the RedZone,” said Dornich. “This year we added Monday Night Football and it’s been a big lift. RedZone as a companion device during other broadcasts and Monday Night Football seem to be our biggest draws.”

Audio Broadcasts Also Popular

Though Verizon’s promotions of the NFL Mobile app center around live video and the company’s new, fast 4G LTE network, it is good old audio broadcasts that account for another big chunk of NFL Mobile use.

“Audio consumption is very high, probably because it’s the perfect companion if you’re doing something like driving, where you can’t watch the screen,” Dornich said. With both home and away audio broadcast choices NFL Mobile can satisfy fans of either side of any NFL contest, and couples the live audio with instantly updated text play-by-play.

According to Dornich, many Verizon wireless customers may start out with the basic free version of the NFL Mobile app, which supports features like the audio broadcasts and play-by-play, and then upgrade to the premium version after getting a taste of the video choices available. Verizon added some video-on-demand features, like in-game highlights, to the basic package this season and Dornich guessed the appetizer has enticed many fans to upgrade for the full meal deal.

For Verizon customers with 3G phones that support video (like the iPhone 4 or the iPhone 4s) the premium NFL Mobile package requires a $10 per month “Verizon Video” fee in addition to any other data plan.

“This year we put the VOD into the basic package so people could see the value,” Dornich said. Verizon is also waiving the $10 monthly fee for the rest of the 2011-12 season for customers who purchase 4G LTE phones. In and of itself, the NFL Mobile app is a bit of a promotional tool for the 4G LTE network, Dornich said.

“It’s really good for us, because [the NFL Mobile app] helps us differentiate our network from the competition,” Dornich said. “It shows customers what the network is capable of.”

Technical Challenges: Getting Good Video to Handsets

One of the biggest challenges for Verizon is optimizing the video streams to the many different handsets that are supported, which include Android smartphones as well as a long list of BlackBerry devices. “It’s not just about delivering the highest bit rate, since you may deliver something that a handset processor could choke on,” Dornich said. “The challenge for us is how to optimize the stream, so it’s right-sized for a particular handset.”

Though the NFL Mobile app is not yet supported on what is fast becoming the couch potato’s favorite companion device — the Apple iPad and its tablet imitators — Dornich said to “stay tuned” for news about iPad and NFL Mobile.

Verizon also takes care to alert potential NFL Mobile heavy users that watching a lot of video on your phone may be hazardous to the health of your monthly data plan. “We are always pretty clear up front that high usage [of NFL Mobile video] may impact your data plan,” Dornich said. One way fans can keep data consumption under control is to seek out Wi-Fi hotspots when they know they are going to watch a lot of video, Dornich said.

Verizon Wireless, which also has mobile apps for fans of the National Hockey League and IndyCar auto racing, said it is happy with the results of its $720 million deal with the NFL, which gives Verizon exclusive rights to cellphone viewing (though fans with other paid packages, like DirecTV’s Sunday Ticket or the Slingbox can also watch their services via a mobile connection).

“We’re very happy with the agreement,” Dornich said. “Our expectations have been validated.”

Filed Under: 4G LTE, Apps, iPad, iPhone, NFL, Sling Media, Verizon Wireless Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

CBS: 214,560 Online Viewers for LSU-Bama Sets New Record

November 6, 2011 by

Turns out we weren’t the only ones sampling CBS Sports’ free online broadcast of the LSU-Alabama game Saturday night: According to the network, the No. 1 vs. No. 2 showdown attracted what it believes to be the biggest-ever online audience for a college football game, with a total of 214,560 unique viewers through both website and mobile-device application interaction.

“CBSSports.com continues to set the pace in terms of streaming major sports event on multiple platforms,” said Jason Kint, Senior Vice President and General Manager, CBSSports.com, in a press release Sunday. “Extending the audience by nearly a quarter of a million viewers during primetime on a Saturday night is quite an accomplishment and the perfect compliment to the CBS Sports broadcast.”

According to CBS, there were 171,648 viewers who watched the game via the CBSSports.com website, and another 42,912 viewers who viewed the game via CBS Sports mobile using an app for Apple iOS devices (either an iPad, an iPhone or an iPod Touch). According to CBS, “this number of unique viewers for the LSU/Alabama game is believed to be the largest audience ever to watch a football game through digital platforms.” Though Mobile Sports Report can’t immediately confirm that claim it’s more than likely true given the limited number of big-time events ever being available for free online.

Though Saturday’s event isn’t close to being the biggest online experience for CBS — according to the press release CBS hosted 1,153,981 online viewers of an NCAA men’s basketball tournament game in 2010 (a first-round game between BYU and Florida) — it also helped prove that online viewers don’t necessarily take away from a regular-broadcast audience, since the TV part of the broadcast earned the network’s second-highest rating since September of 1987. According to CBS the game had an 11.9/21 Nielsen rating.

And while the game might not have lived up to its No. 1 vs. No. 2 hype the expected online audience certainly did, and should mean that we may see more such events toward the end of the year and into college bowl season. Bookmark Mobile Sports Report to stay informed about any future online NCAA football broadcasts.

Filed Under: Apps, CBS Sports, NCAA Football, Nielsen Ratings, Tablets Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Big Online Crowds Expected for CBS Live Stream of LSU-Alabama Matchup

November 3, 2011 by

Live broadcast of College’s #1 vs #2 could change the market.

One of the biggest college football games of the year, regular season edition, is coming this weekend in the LSU-Auburn matchup, and in a sign of the growing importance of presenting sports in all mediums it will be available as streaming media from an online source.

In addition to presenting the game on regular broadcast television, CBS is pulling out all the stops by not just putting the game live online, but also by beefing up its social-media efforts, soliciting fan reactions both prior to and after the Saturday contest.

CBSSports.Com has said that it will be streaming the game that pits No. 1 LSU versus No. 2 Alabama, with the game being presented at CBSSports.com/SECLive. The live streaming video is also available via the Internet to iPhone and iPad users who have downloaded the free CBS Sports app available at cbssports.com/mobile.

Fans can comment online and send tweets while watching from a computer or an iOS device

The broadcast is the centerpiece of CBSSports’ aggressive weeklong coverage of the matchup. That included daily coverage at the Alabama/LSU Central page or the CBSSports.com’s Eye on College Football Blog.

CBSSports has streamed SEC games in the past as well as conference championships on both its website and to iOS devices, with an audience that hovers around six figures — but this is different. Jason Kint, senior vice president and general manager of CBSSports.Com told Fierceonlinevideo.com thats “It’s the biggest football game across all platforms,” and added that he sees this event as a breakthrough for streaming media.

While over the years many big matchups have been touted by the networks only to have them come up short, CBS is playing this one like it could be a preview of the BCS Championship game. The amped-up buildup, plus the stature of the SEC (and its five consecutive BCS championships) should make this online broadcast a far cry from the ho-hum acceptance that many streaming events have received in the past.

Second tier Olympics events, often broadcast at odd hours have garnered little attention and even smaller audiences and have in some ways turned people off to using mobile and handheld devices for watching sporting events, although MLB.com and the NFL have been aggressively pushing out into some segments of this market.

CBSSports will not stop its coverage with the game but will also have its usual postgame show, “5th Quarter with Gary Danielson” as an interactive afterparty. This site can be found at cbssports.com/gary.

Filed Under: Apps, CBS Sports, iPad, iPhone, Live sports via mobile, NCAA Football Tagged With: , , , ,
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