NFL signs promoted tweet deal with Twitter

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In a deal that will likely make its rivals sit up and notice Twitter has signed a deal with the NFL that will feature hosted Tweets that include embedded video, highlights and analysis from NFL games and programs.

The NFL will create a dedicated team to produce content for Twitter not just on game days but seven days a week including in-game video from the Thursday Night games and will feature reports and video from all of a week’s games after they have aired, regardless of which network is showing the game.

The deal’s timing is interesting as it comes just before the expected IPO for Twitter, which was already top of mind for investors prior to this news.

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The deal is interesting for a number of reasons. Twitter already has a partner that has an Amplify deal in Verizon, but apparently that only pertains to the Super Bowl. ESPN is also a partner, but it cannot broadcast NFL video in its tweets, even from its NFL broadcasts, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The agreement is part of Twitter’s Amplify service that enables broadcasters to show video clips and other programming, and ads, which is synchronized with programs that are currently airing, giving users a second screen experience that shows content that might not be available on the broadcast. The two share ad revenue that is generated from the tweets.

You may not be familiar with the Amplify service by name but if you watch sports, or other outlets for that matter, you have most likely witnessed it in action. Twitter already has deals with a number of major players including Turner Sports, the NCAA, ESPN, BBC America, Fox and the Weather Channel.

Hopefully this is a trend that other sports leagues will follow so that when fans are not in front of their screens that can still get more than just a taunting text message from their friends about the state of their favorite team.

(Editor’s note: Interestingly, the video doesn’t work in embedded tweets but redirects you to a Twitter page. Sample video tweet below. Follow @NFL for sponsored video tweets.)

Despite Macintosh Issues, NBC Records Record Audiences for Sunday Night Football Online Streams

Even though Macintosh users are now second-class citizens when it comes to watching NFL games online, NBC this season has still racked up record numbers of online streams of live action, according to NBC.

The NFL’s season opening game, carried by NBC on Thursday Sept. 5, accounted for more than 20 million minutes of online streaming, making it the biggest-ever online sports event that wasn’t a Super Bowl or Olympics, according to NBC. And this past Sunday’s game between the San Francisco 49ers and the Seattle Seahawks racked up another 18 million-plus online minutes, making it the new #2 such online event (surpassing the Week 1 Sunday night show, which totaled nearly 12 million online minutes, according to NBC).

“It’s safe to say we’re definitely seeing a significant increase in online viewing,” said an NBC spokesperson, who spoke with us via phone on Tuesday.

In regards to the issues we (and some of our readers) had in accessing the live game streams from Macintosh computers, NBC had this official response:

“We [NBC] have the ability to stream our linear Sunday Night Football coverage to all desktops, and to tablets through the browser. However, for the 2013 season, we do not have the ability to stream our enriched package, which includes alternate camera angles, to non-Microsoft operating systems.”

Why are Mac platforms second-class citizens this year? It’s an educated guess, but it can probably be traced to the NFL’s deal with Microsoft made earlier this year, though we have no official confirmation of that being the reason. You make the call. What does that mean for Mac users? On Sunday night online, only Windows devices will have access to the “enhanced” online features, including multiple camera angles and social media links. Mac users should still be able to view live action, but only using Safari browsers — Chrome or Firefox won’t work.

So why do some Mac users see no video at all? In my case, I suspect that my reluctance to upgrade my desktop OS or an older version of Safari (which I only use sparingly) is behind my inability to see live video. While some readers said that de-installing Safari AdBlocker allowed them to see live video, others were like me, and couldn’t get the stream to work at all. The NBC spokesperson said they aren’t seeing or hearing about any widespread problems; readers who still have problems next week Sunday, please let us know!

It’s possible that all the problems of favored or shunned client platforms could become a thing of the past in the short-term future, when new NFL TV contracts kick in next year. Part of the problems are simply that technology is moving faster than TV rights contracts — the last time the NFL signed TV deals, tablets didn’t exist at all, so there was no legal language spelling out who could and who couldn’t use them to access live action. Verizon’s NFL Mobile package suffers from similar restrictions, with viewers able to only use cellphones and not tablets via a cellular connection to view live action via the NFL Mobile app. It’s a mess right now, and viewers are paying the price in more ways than one.

What is clear is that many more viewers see online as just another method to access content they have already paid for, either via a cable contract or a cellular or a satellite deal. The onus, I think, is on the league and its content partners to take better care of its customers, who are just trying to watch their favorite sport. They shouldn’t have to both pay and experience the pain of little or no support.

What We Learned at SEAT: Wi-Fi ROI is Elusive, Plan Big for DAS, Apps Not There Yet

Last month we had the great fortune to be invited to the SEAT Conference, which has to be the premier gathering of sports and entertainment facility technology professionals. Over two and a half days we heard many stories of early experiences with technologies like Wi-Fi, DAS, CRM and digital signage, and we left incredibly impressed with both the level of detail and honesty shared at the event.

Quite simply, if you are in the stadium technology business and want to learn what’s happening at the cutting edge, you should put SEAT on your agenda every year, just like all the reps from the biggest stadiums and arenas who make it a regular stop. (Follow this page to find out where and when SEAT 2014 will happen.)

While we are still working on putting together some of the detailed stories from SEAT participants for our Fall technology report, what we can share right now are some overall lessons learned from both the great panel discussions as well as via hallway chats and discussions during the evening events at SEAT. The top three takeaways I had were: stadium Wi-Fi ROI is elusive; you need to plan big for DAS deployment; and stadium apps are still a work in progress.

Apps: Still at the Starting Line

If I move backwards through that list, I can pretty confidently say that the reason many stadium apps are still at the starting line has mainly to do with a lack of deployed infrastructure. Even at facilities where Wi-Fi has been in place for several years, stadium apps both from teams and leagues are mainly just offering basic information and connectivity. The grand dreams of ordering concessions via mobile devices and having them delivered is still a future fantasy for all but a select few facilities now, mainly because most facilities are still just getting their hands around operating a public network.

Wi-Fi ROI: Elusive

And without apps that are tested in live networks, it’s hard to show any bottom-line ROI for Wi-Fi deployments. It’s a real chicken and egg problem, especially now that major cellular carriers are backing away from helping to finance Wi-Fi in favor of paying for DAS deployments. For the most part, stadiums are going to be on their own when it comes to paying for Wi-Fi deployments, since any benefits of putting in such a network will eventually go straight to the team. But that might not happen in a big way until more apps arrive. While pretty much everyone in attendance at SEAT was in agreement that Wi-Fi is going be as necessary and as basic as liquid plumbing, it’s largely a faith-based argument right now.

DAS: Plan for Space

That leads us to DAS, aka Distributed Antenna Systems, which are being deployed just about everywhere mainly because the large cellular carriers (AT&T and Verizon) are paying most of the bills. If there has been a strategic shift in the stadium business the past year it has been the wireless carriers’ change in emphasis from Wi-Fi offload (where Wi-Fi is used to supplement cellular coverage) to DAS, which brings true cellular connectivity to an array of small antennas spread throughout a facility.

There’s a lot of interesting technical and business nuances around DAS, including whether or not a neutral third party should build and host the network. We’ll be covering these issues in much greater detail going forward, because of their immediate and considerable bottom-line impact. But the biggest takeaway we had from DAS had to do with physical space — as in the space needed to host all the DAS equipment on site. Bottom line: You are going to need a lot of room for DAS. (AT&T antenna group guru Chad Townes showed us pictures of the DAS equipment room at the Dallas Cowboys stadium, and it looked like something out of the Matrix — a huge room completely filled with servers and telco gear.)

Why does DAS take up so much room? Basically for every carrier — think Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile — you need to install, on site, a separate cellular base station, with all the networking gear to handle call ideintification and authentication. Then there is more gear to simply manage the connections in all the antennas, plus gear to connect all that to the public networks. And lots and lots of power and air conditioning to keep everything cool.

So how much space do you need? Estimates ranged from 5,000 square feet (about the size of a hotel ballroom) to just a bit smaller. Some facilities said they were putting DAS in buildings nearby, using fiber to connect those buildings to the stadium. But the big takeaway seemed to be, whatever space you think you need for DAS, you probably need more.

Look for more info on these topics in our upcoming Fall technology report. Best way to know when that comes out? Sign up for our email list, via the button in the upper corner of the home page.

Verizon Suffers NFL Mobile Failures on Opening Day

Did you have problems connecting to the Verizon NFL Mobile app Sunday? If so, it’s not your phone — it’s Verizon, which once again proved that it wasn’t ready for the opening day of the NFL season.

As a Verizon customer and a longtime NFL Mobile customer as well, I’ve experienced much frustration over the past couple years due to glitches with the app and programming for it. When it works I am amazed at the ability to watch live football on my phone. But how can two companies, the NFL and Verizon, which make billions in profits each year, have such consistent failures? Does anyone there care if the app actually works or not?

On Sunday I downloaded the new version of the NFL Mobile app, then tried to connect to watch RedZone for the afternoon game endings. I got an authentication failure, which surprised me since I had done everything possible beforehand (turned on all location services, turned off Wi-Fi) to make sure Verizon knew where my phone was.

After going through a half-hour of support hell waiting (including, ironically, a Drew Brees commercial telling me how great NFL Mobile is) I finally got a technician to tell me that because “so many people” were using the NFL Mobile app, Verizon’s network basically went kablooey, and that massive amounts of NFL Mobile users weren’t able to connect. Imagine that! People wanted to watch the NFL today! That’s like not stocking Elmo toys the week before Thanksgiving, or any similarly stupid move. The Verizon rep also told me that “because of high call volume” Sunday there weren’t enough technical reps at work to handle the NFL Mobile outage.

I will give the Twitter reps at NFL Mobile customer support a small bit of respect for finding my tweets and trying to respond, but really — this just shouldn’t happen. Not when the NFL itself says that more people are going to its websites via mobile than via desktops. The biggest app for the biggest sport simply shouldn’t have network failures. And reps shouldn’t be whining that too many people are trying to use it as the reason why it failed. Unless we all get a month’s credit on our Verizon bills.

Is “hiccups” on a server a new technical term? Is there a “hiccup reset” button?

As of 5 p.m. Pacific Time, it still wasn’t working for me. But the support folks found time for humor.

So — Verizon can pay the NFL a billion bucks for NFL Mobile rights, but can’t keep enough engineers on staff on Sundays to make the thing work? That’s fail with a capital F. Which is the grade we give Verizon for its performance on what is probably the sports world’s most-used app. And they’re locked in for four more years. Now I know what a Cleveland Brown fan must feel like.

UPDATE: At 5:42 p.m. Pacific Time NFL Mobile finally authenticated my device. Just in time to watch Tony Romo be Tony Romo.

NFL, Verizon Introduce New NFL Mobile App

New NFL Mobile app; photo courtesy of NFL.

New NFL Mobile app; photo courtesy of NFL.

If you, like me, enjoy watching live NFL action on your Verizon smartphone, things are probably going to be a lot better this season as the league and Verizon have teamed up for a full refresh of the NFL Mobile app, which will also be available to smartphone customers of other carriers, with the only catch being that those customers won’t have access to live game action.

In a phone interview with Manish Jha, General Manager of Mobile at the National Football League, we learned about a whole bunch of new bells and whistles, maybe things you won’t necessarily notice, like improved back-end design and more up-to-date score information. What hasn’t changed for the 2013 season is the $5 monthly fee Verizon will charge its smartphone customers to view live NFL games on Sunday, Monday and Thursday nights, along with NFL network coverage and (perhaps most important) live RedZone coverage on Sunday.

(Don’t dismiss the RedZone coverage. If you live in California, like we do, you can sometimes get a full extra live game or two on Sundays because they are the only ones still going on.)

If your phone is from AT&T, or Sprint, or T-Mobile, you won’t be able to watch live action but you also won’t have to fight to find an NFL app that works well to bring you things like video highlights, replays, scores, and fantasy stats. Jha said the NFL and Verizon teamed up to produce one app to rule them all, the new NFL Mobile app which you should be able to find in the operating system app store of your choice. Also built into the new version of the app are some of the features from last year’s experimental Thursday Night Xtra app, which we never felt was fully baked; hopefully some of its interesting social media ideas are better fleshed out this time around.

“We want to make this the definitive NFL experience for a smartphone,” said Jha. And well should the NFL pay a lot of attention to mobile access: According to Jha, during last season mobile traffic to all NFL Internet sites surpassed desktop Internet traffic, even as that latter figure also increased.

Read that again: Mobile traffic to NFL sites eclipsed desktop traffic last year, even as desktop traffic grew. So now you have an idea why Verizon paid $1 billion to keep the rights for 4 more years as the NFL’s exclusive mobile carrier.

The only thing we still argue about is the league and Verizon’s decision to keep live cellular action off tablets; the Verzion NFL Mobile live access only works for devices they consider “phones,” though Jha even admits that such a definition may be a short-time thing, given the trend of phones getting big phat screens.

“We’re staying on top of trends, watching what comes out of Silicon Valley,” Jha said. “Right now we’re being pragmatic, trying to strike the right balance between serving fans and creating value for our sponsor.”

Verizon Extends NFL Mobile Deal for $1 Billion

Verizon Wireless and the NFL have extended their current deal around mobile viewing of live NFL games, with a $1 billion, 4-year extension announced this week.

The billion-dollar deal does not, however, cover mobile viewing on tablet devices, a distinction noted by this story in Sports Business Daily and one we will bet is going to be kept by the league for its own video streaming plans. There will be more to this story later, but the good news for football fans who have Verizon phones is that for the 2014 season, you will be able to watch all live games — including CBS and Fox broadcasts — and not just the Thursday-Sunday lineup now available.

No word yet on ESPN’s plans to pay for mobile access for sports fans. On the Verizon side, the NFL Mobile viewing access is still apparently priced at $5 per month, but I bet that increases with the increased game schedule in 2014. Got to pay for that $1 billion bill somehow!