Sources: Twitter in talks with Apple to bring its app to Apple TV, hoping to fully capitalize on its live-streaming deals with NFL, MLB, NBA, Wimbledon, others
SAN FRANCISCO — Last March, Twitter and Facebook, along with other tech companies, faced off over which of them would get the rights …
Context & Ripple Effects
Twitter spent July 2016 assembling the supply side of a live-video business: it was in talks with the NBA, MLS and Turner for more sports streaming rights, and signed Bloomberg to livestream three daily shows with shared ad revenue. The missing piece was distribution beyond the phone screen.
This report shows Twitter courting Apple TV as that big-screen outlet for the NFL, MLB, NBA and Wimbledon streams it already holds — turning rights it won against Facebook into a living-room product rather than a mobile-only feed.
First-order effects
- Twitter's existing league and Wimbledon streams gain a potential television-scale audience, making the rights it bought more valuable per dollar of ad inventory.
- Apple TV gets marquee live sports content at no rights cost to Apple — the platform fills its biggest content gap by hosting someone else's expensive acquisition.
Second-order effects
- Rival device makers have an incentive to match quickly, since exclusivity would hand one platform a differentiator; the related coverage of the app later shipping on Amazon Fire TV and Xbox One alongside Apple TV confirms the multi-platform endgame.
- Facebook, which bid against Twitter for the same rights, faces pressure to secure comparable TV-distribution deals or concede the living-room lane to Twitter.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, social platforms evolve from second-screen companions into first-screen broadcasters, forcing leagues to price rights across both mobile timelines and connected-TV apps — and pushing Twitter toward the pay-TV carriage deals COO Anthony Noto described seeking in 2017.
- Connected-TV hardware makers increasingly compete on third-party live content rather than owned libraries, shifting bargaining power toward whoever controls the streaming rights.
The trend: Social media companies are converting mobile live-streaming rights into connected-TV distribution, turning platforms like Twitter into de facto television networks.