NBC Olympics to stream games live on mobile devices
NBC Sports and Adobe Systems have teamed up to give fans two apps that stream the Olympics live on mobile devices, record footage for playback, and share the experience through social media. — The apps — a live-streaming app …
Context & Ripple Effects
This is a fresh datapoint rather than a continuation: NBC Sports has handed the mobile layer of its Olympics coverage to Adobe, whose position is complicated by its confirmed estrangement from Apple over Flash since the iPad's 2010 unveiling — a marquee US broadcaster committing to Adobe infrastructure for its biggest event anyway. The announcement traveled unusually wide for an app launch, picked up same-day by eight outlets including GigaOM, VentureBeat, and The Next Web.
The pairing also leans on assets Adobe has been assembling for years: its 2009 agreement to acquire Omniture at $21.50 per share gave it measurement tooling alongside its video delivery stack, so the NBC apps bundle distribution, DVR-style playback, social sharing, and analytics potential in one partnership.
First-order effects
- US fans get live Games streaming, recorded playback, and built-in social sharing on phones and tablets through two NBC Olympics apps built with Adobe, rather than waiting for televised broadcasts or highlight packages.
- Adobe gains a flagship proof point for its mobile video platform with a top-tier US media partner at a moment when the Apple feud has narrowed its routes onto mainstream devices.
Second-order effects
- Rival Olympic broadcasters face pressure to match live mobile streaming instead of clips-only apps, making the technology vendor behind each country's feed a visible competitive variable.
- Social platforms benefit from event-driven sharing spikes now designed into the apps themselves, strengthening the case for formal sports-content deals between rights holders and networks.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, rights holders stop treating streaming as a per-event add-on and build standing multi-platform operations with dedicated vendor partners and support staff, turning each Games into an infrastructure project rather than a broadcast.
- Measurement drifts from panel-based ratings toward server-side analytics, advantaging vendors like Adobe that own both the delivery pipe and the measurement layer.
The trend: Olympic broadcasting is shifting from a single televised feed to multi-platform streaming operations assembled with specialist technology vendors.