[Rumour] Ron Maclean to replace George Stromboulopoulos on HNIC

[Jay Random]

Originally Posted by nik-

You don't think it's in the interest of the company who paid 5.2 billion for the broadcast rights to sell the game so more people tune in?

They tried that and failed – found that HNIC had already pretty much saturated its target audience. There was nowhere to go but down.

So now they are cutting costs instead. The $5.2 billion is already committed and can't be reduced, but they can reduce their losses by cheaping out on production. Stromboulopoulos's contract was up, so rather than spend more money to renew it, they let him go. Maclean was already on the payroll and his contract still had time to run, so they gave him back the job that he used to do. That way, they don't have to pay an extra salary for a new host. I believe there's not much more to it than that.

Originally Posted by polak

The leagues will soon just open their own streaming services and your internet bill will skyrocket with the death of network tv.

Your money is still going to end up in the same guys hands.

The only people who will lose are the networks themselves.

Your internet bill is not affected one way or the other by the existence of streaming services. If you want the streaming service, you have to pay extra for it. If you don't want it, you don't pay.

The problem with cable TV is that subscribers are given no choice. Sports channels insist on being paid a monthly fee for every cable subscriber – whether those people watch sports or not – as a condition of service.

Suppose you run a cable company. Either you pay ESPN (for instance) $8 per month for every single TV subscriber you have, or you are not allowed to carry ESPN at all. Every cable company in the U.S. submits to this blackmail. In Canada, TSN and SN use the same model.

But you can't extort money from internet providers in the same way. The internet does not care where data is coming from or where it is going. If you block an ISP from having access to your streaming service, people can simply spoof IP addresses to escape the block. Old and true saying: 'The internet treats censorship as damage, and routes around it.'

[nik-]

So they failed and then gave up and cut costs. That doesn't mean it's not in their interests to promote their product in an attempt to gain customers.

Just more indications that they're bad at this.

[Jay Random]

Originally Posted by nik-

So they failed and then gave up and cut costs. That doesn't mean it's not in their interests to promote their product in an attempt to gain customers.

But it's not in their interest to promote their product if there are no more customers to be gained. In that case, money spent on promotion would simply be wasted.

That's the position SN find themselves in. They looked at viewership figures for HNIC and thought there was a big untapped market from which they could recoup their costs and make a profit. But there isn't any such market, and they cannot recoup their costs from the existing viewership. They made a faulty assumption, and paid too much because of it.

[nik-]

They're assuming this because their method failed. That doesn't necessarily mean it's accurate.

[Jay Random]

Originally Posted by nik-

They're assuming this because their method failed. That doesn't necessarily mean it's accurate.

I believe it is accurate. Can you honestly tell me that the CBC, which heavily promoted HNIC for more than sixty years, somehow missed out on a large number of viewers that SN could reach on the first attempt?

The fact is, hockey is a minority interest even in Canada. And many of the people who are interested only want to watch their hometown team, and don't care about national broadcasts involving other teams. They may tune in to watch other teams in (say) the Stanley Cup finals, or to watch national teams at the Olympics (or even the WC). But they have no motivation to watch the national broadcast every week.

Non-fans are non-fans for a reason; it is difficult to turn them into fans. Occasional viewers are occasional for a reason; it is difficult to turn them into regular viewers. The money SN spent on national rights only makes sense if you assume that it is easy to turn people into regular viewers. Evidently SN made that assumption, and since it was wrong, they are reaping the consequences.

[FurnaceFace]

Anyone have numbers on how many Canadians sign up for centre ice? I would imagine the majority of those people watch more than their hometown team.

[Jay Random]

Originally Posted by FurnaceFace

Anyone have numbers on how many Canadians sign up for centre ice? I would imagine the majority of those people watch more than their hometown team.

Unfortunately, it seems that Rogers doesn't release those numbers to the public.

However, I would imagine that 100% of those people watch more than their hometown team, because all hometown games are blacked out on Centre Ice.

[browna]

We will see how Ron does. Don't mind his stories and he is a historian.

But when you have 5 taking heads on a panel who all have to have airtime between periods in the 90 overall seconds they have to talk, he used to get in the way with the stories and anecdotes. Ron often got caught up in a story, then went off on a tangent mentioning someone else, then tries to pull it back as time is short and others need to talk, and the had to cut it off and try to summarize it so it wasn't open ended,and it was all over the place.

The after hours segment in the format like they had last year with Hrudey Friedman and Kypreos, in a more extended, relaxed situation, is better suited for Ron to add his insight...but during the intermissions we will see how much he resists the urge to jump in.
Strombo just let the other guys talk.

[PeteMoss]

Main benefit I see is the whole thing will be calmer with MacLean. With Strombo it just went off the rails at times.

[Ozy_Flame]

I get a sense of peace and relaxation knowing Ron is manning the broadcasting booth.

[saillias]

Originally Posted by Red

Ugh, conversing with some people is really tough. Constantly moving posts. Now we are having a money conversation? How about this for moving posts? Was the Hipster Dufus brought in to promote the game of hockey? The guy that looked like wouldn't know how to tie his skates?

I give up....Go NAT.

The hipster dufus stuff is dumb. 10 years ago haters called him "emo." Now he's a "hipster." Everyone making assumptions about him based on his appearance is kind of disappointing.

[polak]

Originally Posted by saillias

The hipster dufus stuff is dumb. 10 years ago haters called him "emo." Now he's a "hipster." Everyone making assumptions about him based on his appearance is kind of disappointing.

Seriously.

The guy has been a mainstay in Canadian broadcasting for 20 years. He doesn't even look like a hipster. Guy was wearing suits and his hair combed like a normal adult person.

This just screams hipster......



Old folk see a guy that is well put together and caters to younger crowd so he's obviously a hipster....

[Madman]

Don't know if this belongs here or not.

NEWSTALK1010
@NEWSTALK1010
#BREAKING: Body found at Hollywood Hills home of George Stroumboulopoulos. Strombo was not there at the time. LAPD investigating.

[puckedoff]

It only belongs here if the body turns out to be Ron Maclean

[polak]

He's got a home in Hollywood? Does he have anything going on in the States?

[Reggie Dunlop]

Statement released by Stromboulopoulos on Facebook says it was a home he was renting, the victim was a friend, and that it appears to have been the result of a break-in. He is flying to LA right now.

[nik-]

The body is probably the result of a hipster overdose.

[bluejays]

Originally Posted by polak

Seriously.

The guy has been a mainstay in Canadian broadcasting for 20 years. He doesn't even look like a hipster. Guy was wearing suits and his hair combed like a normal adult person.

This just screams hipster......



Old folk see a guy that is well put together and caters to younger crowd so he's obviously a hipster....

The bottom half:

[Deelow]

Originally Posted by polak

He's got a home in Hollywood? Does he have anything going on in the States?

He had that brief CNN show, he also used to host a US reality show I believe. Nothing in the past couple years that I'm aware of.

[Reggie Dunlop]

Originally Posted by polak

He's got a home in Hollywood? Does he have anything going on in the States?

When you're in show business, you go where the money is.