Spark Sport
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@Machpants said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
Pretty good deal when they were talking around a hundy
chatting to a mate in that general industry (who used to work there) he said they're really keen to get into the sport business, and are investing heavily in the infrastructure. Reckons they'll take a bath on the $$$, but see it as an investment.
Makes some sense. Sky is at its weakest at the moment, and once streaming works for folk, the only differentiator will be an outside broadcasting unit.
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People will be able to watch the entire Rugby World Cup on Spark Sport for $59.99 if they take advantage of a "super early bird special" that will go on sale next month, Spark has announced. More games than previously signalled will also be available free-to-air on TVNZ. The price to watch all 48 matches live and "on-demand" on Spark Sport increases to $79.99 if rugby fans leave buying a pass until June, and Spark will bump the price up to $89.99 during the nine days before the tournament starts on September 20. The pricing is designed to encourage fans to sign up to watch the RWC on Spark Sport early, its head Jeff Latch said. But all the prices are below the $100 that managing director Simon Moutter suggested the event could cost when Spark first confirmed it had won the rights to the tournament a year ago. As an alternative to buying a pass, people will be able to pay $24.99 to watch individual matches online once the tournament starts. Twelve matches including all All Blacks' pool games and its quarter-final – assuming the team qualifies – as well as the semifinals and final will also be broadcast free-to-air on TVNZ 1. The semifinals and final and four other games will be shown live by TVNZ, with the other five "free" matches, including the All Blacks' pool games and a potential quarterfinal screening with a one-hour delay. Those 12 matches plus two others will also be available free online through Spark Sport.There had been concerns tens of thousands of homes without high-speed broadband might not otherwise be able to watch the All Blacks play at the tournament in Japan. As well as being able to watch matches live and on-demand, RWC pass-holders will also be able to watch replays and highlights for 30 days following each match. Internet users do not need to have their broadband with Spark to use Spark Sport. Spark said most commercial premises, which include bars, would be able to buy access to the RWC at the same price as consumers, describing that as "a special one-off offer".Spark said it could also switch any other matches live to TVNZ's Duke channel "at a few minutes' notice" if there was a "widespread and significant issue" streaming them through Spark Sport. While Spark was not expecting problems, it was better to have a back-up plan, Latch said.Latch said people who bought Spark Sport RWC passes once they went on sale in May would get immediate access to content such as matches from past tournaments so they could "relive the excitement of previous years".FREE GAMES ON TVNZ 20 September, Japan v Russia: Live 21 September, NZ v South Africa: Delayed by 1 hour 28 September, Tonga v Argentina: Live 2 October, NZ v Canada: Delayed by 1 hour 4 October, South Africa v Italy: Live 6 October, NZ v Namibia: Delayed by 1 hour 9 October, Fiji v Wales: Live 12 October, NZ v Italy: Delayed by 1 hour One quarter final: TBC, but will be the NZ match, assuming the team progress past the pool stage: Delayed by 1 hour 26 October, semi-final: Live 27 October, semi-final: Live 2 November, final: Livehttps://www.stuff.co.nz/business/111932929/5999-to-watch-rugby-world-cup-on-spark-sport
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Fair enough, will jump on the early bird package. The only thing I care about is if it actually bloody works - good to hear they've been investing heavily. Something Sky could learn from with regards to online streaming.
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@No-Quarter Sky seem to be still really slow on 'today's consumer's viewing preferences' (TM). Fanpass still has only the, really shitty and short, highlights package available if you can't watch live - utterly sucks.
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@No-Quarter said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
The only thing I care about is if it actually bloody works - good to hear they've been investing heavily
I signed up for the one month trail and have been watching the F1. I'm on a 100Mbps connection so I have no trouble streaming from a reliable source.
The first race I watched the following day. No problems, the picture looked close to 1080p
The next race I watched live and there were a few issues. The server was under more stress and the frame rate dropped to ~10fps and the audio would drift out of sync.
The stream seemed to have problem adjusting the picture quality to the stream performance. Eventually I stopped and started the app multiple times to force a lower quality image.. once it downgraded the quality the performance was fine. The picture was slightly below 720p with some compression artifactsSo they need to improve their capacity
Also, the app UI is rudimentary. Maybe that's deliberate while they concentrate on the core service.
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@Duluth is there price difference depending on what you want to watch it on?
The $60 package sounds pretty good though, although the per game figure seemed high (was $25 IIRC)
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@taniwharugby not sure.. I haven't seen anything about price tiers
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Nope buy early, 60 bucks, that every game live and on demand for 30 days after, plus punditry and the are old games going up in may so you can wet your whistle. I think it's a really good deal. Works on all devices, no stupid small screen only fan pass shit. Paying 90 near the time is ok, paying 25 per game is stupid, but ordering in may is a no brainer
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Thanks @Machpants Delayed coverage it is for me. (Only an hour??)
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@Hooroo said in And the winner of the RWC broadcasting rights is...:
What time (NZ) ball park will the games be played? If over night, I will likely just record and watch on TVNZ delayed apart from finals footy which is live on TVNZ?
Japan is 5 hours behind us. So a 3pm start would be 8pm NZT or 7pm start 12pm NZT. One hour won't be too much of a hardship
