Quote:
Originally Posted by HOOT
But in your example a company already has the rights to broadcast the game on the radio. Currently there is no way for a Flames fan to legally watch a game streamed, while living in the Flames region. So they wouldn't be stepping on any toes and it would open up more viewers for Sportsnet and the NHLCI/GC package is left in place for those who want to see out of market games.
If your beef is you can't see regional games legally online you have a point but that is Sportsnet's issue, not the NHL. But if you think you should see every game for free and somehow the NHL can replace that lost revenue with some flashy banners you're day dreaming.
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I don't have beef with SNet or NHL. I personally think $200 for GC is worth it but I'm not just a casual fan watching one game a week.
This thread was about piracy and illegal streaming so I only proposed a way that NHL could use to adapt to combat the piracy.
Lets say an average subscriber watches 100 games through GC (82 to follow their home team and watching very little OOT games) which comes to $2/game. Obviously, they're not going to make $2 from advertisement per game from their current subscribers. But lets assume that for every 1 legit GC subscriber, there are 10 users who watches illegal streams (I have no idea what the ratio of GC vs. illegal stream users are, but I would assume its higher than 1:10).
If NHL offered the stream for free and gained those 10 viewers, to break even, they only need to gain less than 20 cents through advertisement per person. Not to mention if they did the Game Center Lite / Plus, there will still be demands for the Plus subscription, including myself, for the additional features it would offer.
Edit: Also, NHL is looking to expand its market in the US. I think there is no better way to expand the market than increasing the availability and exposure of NHL games. Even if streaming free games reduced their GC subscription revenue a bit, it would make sense from business perspective to gain as many new fans as they possibly could through availability and exposure of NHL games.