Amazon Will Spend $1 Billion Per Year on NFL's Thursday Night Football (arstechnica.com) 38
The NFL wrapped up its broadcast contract negotiations for the next eleven years, and a big winner was Amazon, which scored exclusive national rights to Thursday Night Football (TNF). From a report: Going forward, the NFL's weekly Thursday games will be exclusive to Amazon Prime Video, a big change for a package that was previously on terrestrial television or cable. The deal runs from 2023 to 2033 and, according to a report from CNBC, will see Amazon pay $1 billion per year for the TNF package. Thursday Night Football is the NFL's newest and cheapest TV package, but the deal lets Amazon creep closer to parity with the NFL's other licensees, mainstream TV networks like Fox Sports, ABC/ESPN (Disney), CBS (Viacom), and NBC (Comcast). CNBC's report has the other four channels paying upward of $2 billion per year each, and unlike Amazon, the TV networks get to take turns airing the Super Bowl. The NFL's new deal contains streaming provisions for the other providers, too. Each network can now simulcast their games on their streaming service, and some deals scored one or two streaming-exclusive games.
Football vs Safety (Score:2)
Just remember, Amazon thinks Football is more important than worker safety.
Re:Football vs Safety (Score:5, Insightful)
Just remember, Amazon thinks Football is more important than worker safety.
One could say the same thing about the NFL themselves. Perhaps we stop with the stupid arguments now.
Re:Football vs Safety (Score:4, Interesting)
One could say the same thing about the NFL themselves. Perhaps we stop with the stupid arguments now.
Not that I would expect many here to know this, but even in the NFL, significant safety improvements have been made. Professional football is a rather different game than it was a few decades ago, when linebackers could flatten quarterbacks with reckless abandon, and tackles could be extremely brutal.
They've made a considerable number of changes to prevent the most dangerous sorts of tackles and takedowns, especially in the last 10-15 years. If a player so much as touches a facemask, they're likely to be called. No allowance for helmet spearing. No longer can linemen bring down a quarterback with their full weight. Helmet to helmet contact of any sort is a serious offense. Special protection is mandated for players who are deemed "helpless" or vulnerable. Even some fundamental rules such as kickoffs have been altered to try to reduce high-speed contact injuries.. And immediate medical examination is mandated on any sort of suspected concussion or head/neck/spine trauma.
I suppose, if one is being cynical, one could argue that the teams are simply protecting their multi-million dollar investments in their top players, especially their quarterbacks. And of course, it remains a dangerous sport, with a large number of injuries. But the many safety rules introduced lead me to believe that genuine efforts are being made to reduce the most serious of injuries, especially head trauma.
newscorp (Score:2)
amazon are simply copying newscorp / sky
buy sports broadcasts and sell a subscription to other junk
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Welcome to a free society. Ban everything that is unsafe and life is not worth living.
The players are adults and they know the dangers.
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Welcome to a free society. Ban everything that is unsafe and life is not worth living.
The players are adults and they know the dangers.
Yes, of course, the good old, "Welcome to fuck you and your choices for not knowing, or knowing and not caring, or knowing and caring, but not enough to help others 'free' society."
What this losers dont tell people is the FREE TO ABUSE is the FREE part.
Re:Football vs Safety (Score:4, Interesting)
Just remember, Amazon thinks Football is more important than worker safety.
Amazon paying for broadcasting rights is similar to a cost of goods sold (COGS) for all the products it sells online (not sure if it meets the definition for accountants, but it's similar in principle). Amazon paid $233 billion in 2020 for COGS, which is far more than this deal with the NFL.
So basically you could use this argument for any product Amazon sells. Like Amazon thinks batteries are more important than worker safety because they bought batteries to sell on their site instead of spending that money on worker safety.
I'm not happy with Amazon's safety track record either, but your argument is silly.
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Amazon spent over $800,000,000 by May on COVID19 remediation, more than Walmart and Target combined have spent to date. Since then they've doubled that again.
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Amazon spent over $800,000,000 by May on COVID19 remediation, more than Walmart and Target combined have spent to date. Since then they've doubled that again.
It's easy to get lost in big numbers when the scale of companies like Amazon are beyond what average people deal with in their lives. Covid led to profits at Amazon nearly doubling in 2020, leading to about a $10 billion increase in profits. $800 million in Covid19 remediation doesn't sound that impressive when the same pandemic which led to their recent success brought in over somewhere around 5-10 times in extra profits what they spent on protecting their workers.
Walmart and Target may have done even wors
Re:Football vs Safety (Score:5, Insightful)
Football thinks football is more important than worker safety.
local team games are still on terrestrial televisi (Score:2)
local team games are still on terrestrial television.
The NFL is the only sport that does that.
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Re: local team games are still on terrestrial tele (Score:1)
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Cause most of their remaining fanbase are broke rednecks living in trailer parks.
replace bold with susceptible to advertising and unable to get rid of it
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local team games are still on terrestrial television, as long as the game is on Sunday.
Fixed that for you. ESPN still gets exclusive rights to Monday, Amazon is now the only place to watch Thursday games. I forget where you have to go to watch the London games.
ALL local team games are still on terrestrial tele (Score:2)
ALL local team games are still on terrestrial television. London games / TNF / MNF / Sunday / Saturday games.
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A series of four-to-eight second sprints of large men with a ball results in billions of dollars changing hands. It amounts to what, four minutes of time spread over the course of 45 minutes in less than ten-second increments?
What a pathetic joke.
I guess you could consider all the time between snaps as wasted time, if you need constant stimulation during the game to keep your interest. I for one enjoy watching football more than something like hockey where the action is far more consistent. It feels like exercise keeping track of where the puck is. I'd rather be able to divert my gaze to eat nachos or talk to friends without feeling like I'm missing something.
A football game in 2020 had 8.76 scoring plays per game (not counting extra point attempts)
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I just googled "average game time by sport" and the top result was a table that had football at 3h10m with 150 30s commercials with hockey coming in at 2h20m with 60 30s commercials. That's a lot of nachos. I stopped watching football on a regular basis some time ago. Even watching rugby games on a recent to visit to Ireland was more enjoyable and I had to ask someone explain the rules.
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I would argue scoring attempts are more exciting than actual scores. The number of shots on goal, breakaways, etc. in the NHL make a game much more fun to watch even if they don't score, in comparison to watching some NFL trying to run the clock by running the ball up the middle three times in a row and then punting.
What makes you prefer one sport and me prefer another are absolutely all fair game. To each their own. I really do understand why many people would find the NFL boring. Hockey doesn't appeal to me because most times I hear what makes it appeal to others, none of them hold true to me. Enjoying hockey because of more scoring attempts to me is like enjoying football more if there were constant hail marys into the end zone just hoping some are caught. That is what the constant slap shots just hoping some will e
NFL needs streaming (Score:2)
One less game for me to watch (Score:2)
It's not as if there isn't anything else going on Thursday night.
I refuse to shell out money for a bunch of video services that only have one or two things I may want to watch, and I am not a fan of the local NFL team anyway.
This is all too much (Score:1)
Most football games on Sunday I can watch on regular channels like CBS, NBC and FOX. But for Monday Night football I need ESPN, which means getting a package of channels that include ESPN through a cable provider (subscribing to ESPN+ does not fix this). Many of the other channels I do not and will not watch. Thursday night football normally comes on NFL Network. If I wanted that, I would need another large package of channels on top of the one that includes ESPN.
Now I need to subscribe to Amazon Prime for
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Anyone else disappointed (Score:2)
Att direct tv is keeping everything locked up.
Fox still doesn't have a streaming only option.
Basically they signed a 10 year agreement to keep nfl streaming complicated and expensive.
When the last 5 years have proven what a diaster it is.
In order to stream all nfl games you need to sign up for peacock, amazon, paramount, nfl network, and have a cable line to get fox sports.
Sounds like in 5 years the nfl is going to be wondering why viewership is down even more.
When Exclusivity == Monopoly (Score:4, Insightful)
In this case the deal looks to be relatively narrow, but the principle that this is a monopoly remains true. The problem with this is that it is entirely artificial. Amazon have made a larger bid to the NFL and in return for that bid they get exclusive broadcast rights. Amazon are betting that they will recoup their bod cost through sales of their Prime service so people can watch a game.
Now, if Amazon fail to recoup their costs, the process might fall apart... But if they make a profit, what's to stop them from buying up exclusive rights to another sport, then another, another, maybe other types of content including movie releases, TV shows, on and on.
The point being that "exclusive deals" seem to make it much more likely for "monopoly control" to become possible. We're constantly told that "free market forces" are the thing that makes "capitalism" better than "communism". But here's the thing: the argument that capitalists make against communism is that all choice is taken away by the state and that everyone has to make do with what the state gives them. But how is that different if capitalism is turning into a series of interlocking monopolies? But we shouldn't allow the sort of practices that this could lead to.
If we do, one successful company will be able to acquire the wealth and power to wipe out all competition, which leaves us much worse off.
Lets hope that the FTC will step up and do some useful work on this topic. Some simple laws/rules/requirements would go a long way - one being, "no exclusive deals" for bought/sold content.
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Are you trolling? Football is essentially a finite resource - there are only so many games per year, and the companies that bid to broadcast the games have really good accountants who know what the revenue and profit will be for those games. The NFL auctions off the broadcast of these games. Amazon bid $1B for the Thursday games - cheaper than the other games because Thursday games are absolute dogshit. "Exclusive rights" is just a stupid way of saying it.
Why the heck would the NFL need let every single bro
And then there's reality (Score:2)
> what's to stop them from buying up exclusive rights to another sport, then another, another, maybe other types of content including movie releases, TV shows, on and on.
That's an interesting theory. Theoretically that prediction is possible. In fact, the NFL has been around for a hundred years now. So we don't have to predict, we know what has happened.
No need to predict the past.
In fact, the NFL does actually have distribution agreements with
Amazon, CBS, ESPN/ABC, FOX, and NBC.
That's the actual realit
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The point being that "exclusive deals" seem to make it much more likely for "monopoly control" to become possible. We're constantly told that "free market forces" are the thing that makes "capitalism" better than "communism". But here's the thing: the argument that capitalists make against communism is that all choice is taken away by the state and that everyone has to make do with what the state gives them. But how is that different if capitalism is turning into a series of interlocking monopolies? But we shouldn't allow the sort of practices that this could lead to.
Entertainment is considered to be infinitely fungible. Not substituteable since if you're not watching the NFL, you're not watching the NFL. But fungible. There's always something else to do with your time.
I used to watch League of Legends pro play, even going so far as to attend in person a season finals played in my city. Then Twitch bought exclusive access so games stopped showing up on YouTube. The Twitch client on AndroidTV is dogshit so... I stopped watching. It was too difficult to find games i
Bad time to be a team owner (Score:3)
One by one, Bezos will replace the current teams with Amazon owned and branded teams.
Hey it worked on their traditional sales platform.
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Tax subsidies (Score:2)
Since I have Amazon Prime .. (Score:1)
Fools (Score:1)