The Next Olympics Will Be Streamed More Thanks to Your Precious Tablet
So many people streamed the London Olympics on their tablets that the next time NBC broadcasts the Olympics, a scant two years away, there's going to be a lot more streaming on the proverbial broadcast menu.
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Do you even remember our brief love affair with the Olympics from this summer? Summer seems like it was so long ago now. Who is Gabby Douglas again? Anyway, NBC is finally looking at the pages of research they did looking at how we, the common folk, consumed the Olympics, and the results are good if you're one of the "small but vocal group" who preached for more streaming:
The growing number of viewers who own tablets will only lead to more streaming. “That’s clearly a glimpse of where tablets are going,” Mr. Wurtzel said. Thinking ahead to the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, in 2014 and to the Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, he added: “All bets will be off as the price of tablets goes down.”
All bets are off, he says. No bets. Got it. According to NBC's numbers, more people streamed the women's soccer final and women's gymnastics events than the entire 2008 Olympics combined. The key thing for NBC was they noticed streaming things didn't hurt their primetime audience for the tape-delayed coverage. Once they noticed that, all bets were off for what else NBC Sports could stream. NBC is even streaming NFL games because of what the Olympic data told them, says NBC Sports chairman Mark Lazarus. They're still going to use an authentication system where you have to prove you're an existing cable subscriber, though. Regardless, you should probably thank the person you know who watched the Olympics on their iPad before 2014 rolls around.
