Content is Not Always King, But "Sunday Ticket" is Close

But sometimes it makes a huge difference.

As part of a new four-year, $4 billion deal struck between DirecTV and the National Football League, DirecTV "Sunday Ticket" subscribers will now also have the option of getting any game streamed to their laptops.

It is the first time the NFL has licensed the online rights to its games. DirecTV says streaming will begin “no later than 2012."

The NFL, though, also won the right to create a new channel called “Red Zone Channel," to be launched in the next couple of years, that shows real-time highlights of NFL games that will be distributed on multiple media, including cable, satellite, online and mobile.

DirecTV executives have been adamant about retaining their exclusive deal for out-of-market games, believing (correctly) that in this particular case, exclusivity allows it to lure subscribers away from cable and other satellite TV companies.

Sports programming continually is cited by cable operators as a primary reason for continual rate hikes. The new NFL deal is more of the same, on that score.

Still, DirecTV does have a point. The only reason this particular subscriber would choose DirecTV over FiOS (someday soon that will be an option) is "Sunday Ticket."

So content might not be king. Some of us would argue, looking just at the amount of money consumers and businesses already spend, the communications is king. Still, content, if not king, can in some cases swing a subscriber choice from one provider to another.

http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-nfl-signs-new-4-billion-directv-deal-games-to-be-streamed-online/