For TV, the Internet is not a foe
NBC paid an “exorbitant” sum for the right to broadcast the Beijing Olympics on TV, says the Los Angeles Times in an editorial, but for the first time it’s also streaming the games over the Internet. And despite NBC’s Web-viewing restrictions, and those imposed by the International Olympics Committee, “avid sports fans” have been able to find and share video of the games online. “Is that a bad thing for broadcasters? NBC’s boffo TV ratings suggest the opposite.” NBC is getting more Web traffic a day than it did during the entire 2004 games, but lots more TV viewers, too. The lesson here is that the Web is actually “the route to more viewers, online and off.” If networks don’t take advantage of that, someone else will.
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