Foxtel will bring some sport out from behind the paywall with selected Supercars rounds, A-League & W-League games and other “entertainment shows and documentaries” available via Kayo Freebies (that is a terrible name). After signing up to Kayo the events will be free to stream. The first free sport will be the Bathurst 500 on 26 February.
Source: The Australian
STARTING WITH THE MT PANORAMA 500 LIVE AND FREE
Kayo Sports, Australia’s number one sports streaming service, today announced the launch of Kayo Freebies, making a selection of live sports, entertainment shows, documentaries available for free.
Kayo Freebies, available to stream online through kayosports.com.au and the Kayo Sports app, will launch later this month with its first live Freebie – one of Australia’s most iconic Supercars races, the Mt Panorama 500 starting February 26. Selected A-League and W-League games will also be available as Kayo Freebies with more Freebies announced in the coming weeks.
Kayo Sports CEO, Julian Ogrin, said: “Kayo has experienced massive subscriber growth over the past two years and is now established as the go-to destination for streaming 50 sports live. We have the biggest line-up of sport from the world’s best producers including FOX SPORTS, BeIN SPORTS and ESPN, and we are seeing our customer base continue to grow with record audiences for our AFL, NRL, Cricket and motorsport coverage.
“Kayo Freebies is another game-changing moment. We believe Kayo Freebies will increase our audience share for selected events, expand audiences for growing sports and ultimately take Kayo’s subscription growth to the next level.”
Sports fans can access Kayo Freebies by simply downloading the Kayo App and creating an account. Kayo Freebies are free, and no credit card details are required to sign up and start streaming. Freebies will have new live events each month, regular live games from selected sports together with replays, Kayo Minis and special events featuring documentaries and classic matches.
Mr Ogrin added: “Kayo is the unrivalled service for streaming the world’s best sport. We know when people try Kayo, they love the experience. Freebies is a way of bringing even more sports fans closer to our brand, enjoying the best commentators and production, and experiencing our technology, which has been built specifically for streaming live sport.”
The SMH reports that there will be ads during the free streams on Kayo Freebies, so that’s how Foxtel will make money out of this. It will also help Foxtel meet it’s obligations for the $40 million it receives from the federal government for broadcasting under-represented sport.
Does subscribers get a discount then?
Why would they? They’re getting all available content, features and benefits ad free.
This is selected games or matches with ads, big difference.
So with ads means the same as FTA broadcasts? (ie ads after goals, ads every 15 minutes in races, breaks in play, etc?)
literally the first year it’s being run
At
places:
Speedcafe are reporting that Seven aren’t happy that Kayo will be offering the Mt Panorama 500 as a free stream considering it infringes upon their free streaming rights
It was an issue between Seven and Foxtel in late October, but it appears that nothing was resolved as Foxtel has just gone ahead with their plan.
Well that didn’t take long for seven to have an issue with the rights of the Supercars. When will they say, “that’s it, we will walk away from this contract” like they have done for the cricket.
Do they not read the fine print on contracts they sign??
It reminds me of when Nine had the AFL and they were all very happy, than David walked into Kerry’s office and said; “um… we don’t have the AFL finals, only the minor rounds…”.
C’mon seven, if you don’t like it, go for all the rights not just a the bottom of the barrel.
They only just signed the shitty rights deal. Super cars have done themselves no favors by 1) signing with seven at all 2) signing a simulcast deal yet again 3) signing with only 6 races on free to air
They are really doing a great job of running their sport into the ground. No one will know it exists in a few years time.
Not to mention the fact that the series is based upon big banging V8s from Ford and Holden - of which none are manufactured in Australia, Holden is no longer an active concern (aside from its service arm) and not many consumers buy the cars the category is meant to showcase.
They are better off going back into the old Class A format of the 80s and doing a better deal going to consumers via IPTV.
How is this Sevens problem/fault?
Seven say they’re exclusive free-to-air broadcasters (Which include streaming), and Supercars have backed them up. Its seems that it’s Foxtel that’s violating the agreement, not Seven being unable to read fine print
Fox has the online rights, Kayo has the ability to show it in what ever form they require to make money. If that means changing the product to suit their business they will.
The moment seven picked up the rights to include the online part, Kayo would have been working out a new idea.
Both Fox and Seven have online rights. However, the issue is Seven are claiming Foxtel/Kayo’s rights don’t allow them to offer free streams (at least for the races which Seven also shows).
If that’s correct, you can understand their argument considering Kayo could ‘trample over’ Seven’s rights by simply offering all of the FTA races on the new free tier/package
Totally agree. All depends on what that fine print says.
I don’t think I made it clear in my pervious post, I don’t agree with what Kayo is doing and this is typical Murdoch Press, throwing their weight around and pushing their own agenda.
The Telstra live NRL and AFL apps are to be replaced with a discounted $5 subscription to Kayo for eligible Telstra customers.
Those two apps are not completely disappearing, it’s just that to stream live games, fans will have to subscribe to Kayo.
The Age adds that Telstra’s applications for netball and A-League will continue to operate but are expected to be removed in favour of Kayo should Foxtel win the broadcast rights.
$5 is a no brainer pricepoint - I wonder what the catch is?