Strap in sports fans, because the decade to come will bring about the biggest changes to the way we consume sport since the introduction of television itself.
If you cast your mind back to the start of this decade, you most likely had a big-screen TV and, as a sports lover, a Foxtel box underneath it. The television would have been analogue and the figures on the screen slightly grainy.
During the decade, many traded these TVs for a digital version and the difference in clarity was remarkable. With digital came the streaming services.
Changing viewing habits will have major ramifications for all sports.CREDIT:GETTY
The pivotal year was 2015: Netflix launched in Australia, Nine Entertainment introduced Stan and by the end of the decade, there was Apple TV, Amazon Prime, Optus (with the Premier League) ...
Channel Nine started the decade broadcasting its mainstays of NRL and cricket, and finished the decade with NRL and tennis. Seven had AFL and tennis, and finished with AFL and cricket.
Foxtel, via Fox Sports, had a few sports channels, but by 2019 had at least seven running at any one time, including Fox Footy, Fox League and Fox Cricket, plus ESPN 1 and 2, and Eurosport and Chelsea TV and on and on.
But, tellingly, Foxtel also now broadcasts almost all of this sport on a streaming service launched in 2018 called Kayo.
And that’s where we’re headed in the 2020s.
By the end of next decade, there will not be a Foxtel box in any house in Australia. Just like taxis were replaced by Uber and Kodak was monstered by digital phone cameras, television streaming will kill off the 25-year life of cable TV in this country.
Starting at the top, the next round of NRL and AFL television rights negotiations will bear little resemblance to those of the past, when they were fairly predictable. It ran like this: channels Nine and Seven were courted by the sports and, eventually, one of them cut a deal with Foxtel (Fox Sports) and the spoils were divvied up and away we went for another five or six years.
Foxtel won’t quite be in the same position in the future. Its revenue base is decreasing rapidly as it tries to hang on to overpaying subscribers against cheaper streaming competitors. Even its own Kayo service, at $25 a month, undercuts itself. A basic Foxtel subscription is now about $50, but was well over $100 during the decade, especially if you never made a phone call to them.
But without League and AFL, Fox Sports dies – and its bosses know it.
For free-to-air networks, the big sports are loss leaders: millions upon millions to buy the rights and the same to fund the actual broadcast. It can’t all be recouped by advertising. But it does bring eyeballs to the networks, which then hope they watch their news service and are convinced to watch
MAFS or
My Kitchen Rules via the endless promos.
The common belief is that even the big sports are in for a haircut this decade when they renegotiate their broadcast deals.
To stave off the haircut, all sports are cuddling up to all three commercial networks and Optus and Netflix and Amazon Prime and Apple TV and ...
Some may think the NRL, for instance, would be mad to broadcast its matches through Amazon Prime’s app.
This would be an extremely short-sighted view. Streaming apps could be big players. At $7.99 a month, an Amazon Prime subscription is nothing. By the end of next decade, I guarantee streaming services will have rights to big sports in this country because watching television through an app will be the norm.
Consumers won’t bat an eyelid. Teenagers now will be in their 20s by 2029 and their television brand loyalty will be non-existent.
I recently wanted to buy a golf club from the US. I found it on Amazon. They then said they would ship it to me for free if I trialled Amazon Prime. So I did.
The golf club arrived in three days from Kentucky and we, as a family, were watching
Jack Ryan on Amazon through our Apple TV.
It’s happening and sports should not be afraid of change.
Expect an American-style sell-off where one network won’t have it all. Thursday night NRL could be on Amazon Prime, Friday on Channel Nine, Saturday on Kayo, Sunday afternoon on Channel Seven.
Second-tier sports, for want of a better phrase, are those most vulnerable: rugby union, the A-League, the NBL. The big players will offer them less, but maybe one of the newer players will present them with an opportunity they can’t resist.
Rugby finding itself being broadcast on Optus does not need to be as frightening as it seems.
Using streaming services doesn’t scare consumers – and it shouldn’t scare sports.
https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/sp...stream-becomes-a-torrent-20191219-p53lkb.html
