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posted by martyb on Wednesday November 01 2017, @11:58AM   Printer-friendly
from the American-game-of-FOOTball-which-is-played-using-your-HANDs dept.

Is ESPN done for?

ESPN pays $2 billion a year to the NFL for Monday Night Football and one NFL wild card playoff game. I've written for the past couple of years that as ESPN's business collapses that ESPN's decision on whether or not to bid to keep Monday Night Football would be the first big test of how rapidly that business is deteriorating.

What's a deteriorating business look like? In the month of October ESPN lost over 15,000 subscribers a day in October per the latest Nielson estimates.

15,000 a day!

Losing 15,000 subscribers per day is a lot, but is that because of the NFL anthem protests or because cord-cutting has finally reached a tipping point?


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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 01 2017, @02:56PM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 01 2017, @02:56PM (#590572)

    This to some degree is what pushed me away from UFC. I still love the sport, but the advertising is just simply obnoxious. Every other replay being 'brought to you by' some company, or random advertisements being plastered on the screens during matches. And of course their stickers and logos everywhere. I haven't watched a bout in a year or two now. Just lost its charm when it feels like commercials and advertising became a bigger focus than the competition itself.

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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by bob_super on Wednesday November 01 2017, @05:20PM (3 children)

    by bob_super (1357) on Wednesday November 01 2017, @05:20PM (#590670)

    US TV is unbearable, especially football, and its pinnacle the Superbowl.
    You have a 40-minute "sport" in which the ball is moving about 11 minutes, which turns into a 5-hour show. Even counting some legitimate replays, which do consume three to five times as many minutes as the action, it's still an absolutely insane attention-span-killer rush to commercials.
    You forgot to mention the ads in the room/stadium/on performers. Ad-covered people/cars playing by ad-friendly rules so they can maximize ad breaks and ad-sponsored commentary ... and you're supposed to pay for the privilege to attend or watch?

    I love all the idiots who fall for this shit: they indirectly pay my mortgage.

    • (Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday November 01 2017, @10:37PM (2 children)

      by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday November 01 2017, @10:37PM (#590794)

      US TV is unbearable, especially football, and its pinnacle the Superbowl.

      For a good time compare imported Japanese subtitled "Ninja Warrior" which is pretty enjoyable despite my Japanese being limited to one mostly forgotten semester, vs the american produced "Ninja Warrior" which is mostly human interest shitposting and commercials with occasional short interruptions of actual athletics, but certainly less than 5 minutes of actual action per hour.

      It makes me wonder what American football with Japanese producers would look like. Remember American management couldn't build a car to save their lives in the 70s... maybe the 20s will do to American TV what imports did to American cars in the 70s. We can only hope.

      • (Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday November 01 2017, @10:48PM

        by bob_super (1357) on Wednesday November 01 2017, @10:48PM (#590797)

        Considering how the answer to declining viewership has been to shrink the 42-minute-per-hour towards 38 minutes (i.e. going from 18 to 22 minutes of ads per hour, including automatically dropping frames in old reruns), I wouldn't bet on the US execs admitting that they have a real problem.

        With the likes of PAI at the FCC, and the power of the **AA, The Great FireWall of Trump could become a China-like reality. Because who needs freedom when there's money to be made, and Children To Think Of?

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @01:25AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @01:25AM (#590826)

        Well I used to think you were an old douche. Now I know you are just another 30-40 something douche. If you were old at least you'd have an excuse.