Updated: Sling Media, the early leaders in place-shifting technology have scored a touchdown – they are working with DirecTV on a new offering called SuperCast.
As part of this deal, viewers can get online streams of NFL games every Sunday. The deal has been rumored for a while, but it has been confirmed by a company spokesperson. I couldn’t get the details last night since it was very late, but we spoke to the company and here is the lowdown.
First of all you don’t need a Sling Player to get this video package and you don’t need the Sling software. The video steams are accessed with the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser. If you are a DirecTV/NFL Sunday (HD) package customer, then you get access to the games the web for free as part of your package.
Sling Media is providing a hosted service to DirecTV and is managing the web-operation, including authentication and also decides which streams are available to you based on where you live. The videos are being streamed off DirecTV’s servers, not Sling’s servers. Sling also built the browser-based front end for DirecTV. The service only works with IE browser, which is kinda lame. This is a new business foray for Sling, which till now has been purely a hardware vendor.
The company is looking to expand this business. John Malone, who now owns DirecTV is also an investor in Sling, as is Charlie Ergen, the maverick behind Echostar (DISH), and have been the biggest supporters of Sling. National Hockey League has also partnered with Sling for its clip-and-sling service.
I’m confused does this mean they ae streaming content directly to the slingbox devices themselves bypassing the Direct TV satellite?
or does this mean as a slingbox owner I can now use a PC/browser to vew the games on teh Direct TV website?
or does this mean that they are lifting some form of DRM on the slingboxes themselves that I can now access this content I legally should have been able to view anyway?
Some actual depth/information in the article would be nice rather than regurgitating the pr piece.
Cheers,
Dean
Just stream the games please! I’m sick of going to bars on Sundays and being forced to pay/drink beers!
…maybe I can sue the NFL for making me an alcoholic…
http://www.SoUrban.net
This would be very interesting to me if I could just subscribe to NFL Sunday Ticket. It’s not so interesting to me as it is though, because I’m not a DirectTV subscriber – and if I were, I would just watch on my TV.
Seems like a lost opportunity to add people to just this package.
Dean, i updated the post with more details. It was late at night so couldn’t get the details then.
I know how you feel Tim. Anyway maybe NFL will listen to the peeps and give them what they want.
So this really has nothing to do with the normal sling hardware/service? They are just the company that built this new service.
I can only assume they might do more programming since they just built the ability to do any type of program from DirecTV.
I think I like the way I did it better. This comes with Superfan which last I checked was an extra $99/year. I recently paid a one time $99 fee for a Slingbox AV and can not only watch my NFL Sunday Ticket games but also anything else on my DirecTivo (which I can now control remotely over the internet). Not sure why anyone would opt for this over a Slingbox unless it comes free with HD (which I don’t have yet) or they like other features like the red zone and all games channels.
This is a great idea. About time they came out with this. I will be using this when I am traveling.
I am a Seahawks fan from Sao Paulo, Brazil.
I really liked your blog with the Seahawks mention item. I grew up watching Curt Warner and Dave Kreig.
I try to follow as much NFL news as I can with the internet.