They only air selected NASCAR races though
2 Likes
How did they get around anti-siphoning?
It depends what they mean by “live and exclusive” or even “exclusively live”
Australia round live on 10. Tape delay outside of Australia on Bold or even God forbid highlights.
Lets not jump the gun because the FTA component still could be like the one in the UK.
I don’t think Moto GP is on that anymore.
I thought it still was but how did Fox Sports manage to get around the anti-siphoning laws for netball. When Test Matches involving Diamonds in Australia has to be shown on FTA.
In fact I think its still Tier 1 sport. Alongside AFL, NRL and Melbourne Cup.
1 Like
I’ll have to check that one. I know they can get around it though if none if the FTA channels bid for the rights.
The Australian MotoGP remains on anti-siphoning list. Foxtel tell me they intend to offer rights to the Australian round to an FTA partner. All other races will be exclusive to Foxtel. https://tvblackbox.com.au/page/2021/08/12/motogp-to-move-behind-the-pay-wall-after-foxtel-secures-new-exclusive-broadcast-deal-motogp/
They get around it by allowing people to watch it via Kayo, it’s part of the freebie viewing.
The Australian Gov is happy for Murdoch, sorry I meant Kayo to particular show sport free via that platform.
That’s why netball was able to be picked up by them, which Nine is still not happy about.
It’s a disaster waiting to happen. These stupid are mad going with a paytv provider only. FTA will always have biggest reach.
2 Likes
I totally agree, just look at netballs history.
All exclusive on OneHD, than moved exclusive to Foxtel, the numbers dropped off, the League almost went bankrupt. Nine stepped in, exclusive, the league had growth again, numbers through the roof, so what does the board do, move it back to Foxtel.
With likes of CBS and Nine now realising the strength of having exclusive deals, it’s really game on. To the point that Foxtel went early with the MotoGP rights, to keep the others out.
Last year Foxtel used covid as the reason to get the AFL/NRL to extend the rights deal, without going to market. It has nothing to do with covid, it had everything to do with the fact that they are spooked by nine/cbs and Fox are wanting to hold on to the farm.
If they lose either NRL or AFL, Kayo will go backwards, which will have huge ramifications for the whole business.
2 Likes
Did any FTA network express interest in the rights?
Listing single events in a motorsport season can mean that FTA have to pick up a whole season that they may not necessarily want (especially for something like F1 and MotoGP where the majority of the season is at awkward times and is a little bit niche)
This is not really free viewing. You still have to create an account. They will hammer you with promotion to sign up and the reality is causal fans are not going to sign up to watch the odd game of netball. The power of free to air is the person with the remote flicking the channels on. You’d need to be an avid fan to seek out kayo freebies, sign up and stream to your tv.
Netball will flounder again I’m afraid.
Fox can have MotoGP. It is more niche. They only have one Australian round and whilst it did well on Bold for the live races, it would hardly attract many advertisers for FTA networks to seek out the rights. 10 has treated it well but in reality their strategy is now altered.
2 Likes
It will force netball fans to buy a ticket for a local Super Netball game if they don’t want to subscribe to Kayo.
Yes, but Netball fans will follow. Fans will follow their sport to wherever they need to be to watch it. We are talking about getting the casual viewers, who are channel surfing and find the netball. This can’t happen anymore when it is on Kayo.
1 Like
I think with netball too, the broadcast deal is so important to the player contracts. It seems to me that they don’t really have much other income. Sponsorships aren’t massive and ticket sales don’t seem to be huge either although tickets for netball aren’t cheap too. Obviously this is why Netball Australia went with Foxtel. They must have offered the most money.
well yeah. Sometimes money shouldn’t be the trump card though.
1 Like
You could make the same argument for casual viewers and most sports
Money is what is keeping these competitions going and a large proportion of their revenue is coming from media rights.
Netball has been under pressure to pay their players more (and we’ll see this more particularly with women’s sport), the only way they are able to do this is to maximise income.
Cough Seven Cough
Some times casual fans turn into die hard fans. Would I have grown to love cricket if it was behind a paywall when I was growing up, seems unlikely.
3 Likes