Kvalserien - Now at a Computer Near You

For once the Gods are smiling at me. Visasatondemand is running an offer on all packages (films, entertainment, documentaries and most importantly sports). The package concerns their web broadcasts and will include the live matches from Kvalserien. The official schedule is yet to be released so it is impossible to say what games will be included, but it will be at least two or possibly all games in every round available on their web service. For SEK99 you can now get this for a period of one month, and as KS only runs until April 10, all rounds are now covered.  Considering one game retails at SEK79, this is quite a bargain. You can cancel the service at any time during the first month and not be charged for a second month.

Of course, the service is geographically limited to Sweden due to broadcasting rights. If anyone abroad would be interested in this service I can give a few pointers in how to go about circumventing the geographical IP block. Note that I am in no way endorsing breaching the terms and conditions, merely presenting a technical weakness in their system. But why they are so protective about second tier Swedish ice hockey could be anyone's guess. We only export IKEA, Abba and Volvo - the interesting stuff we keep for ourselves! It sounds like a both likely and valid reason...

The Anguish of Living Abroad

Every year at the start of the hockey season, I find it difficult to come to terms with living abroad. As the season gets under way this only tends to get worse, and by the time of Kvalserien it has become outright painful. This season has been the worst of them all so far. The main reason I believe is that the TV rights have passed over to Viasat - none of the London pubs have access to Swedish viasat, so I have been forced to watch games on the internet. se24 is working for us foreigners, but viasatondemand is not, due to broadcasting rights. I have however found a way around this after spending hours searching for any way to get around the checks done - if you'd need to know how, please contact me.

Another reason for my anguish is that Leksand has been playing such bad ice hockey it has been painful to watch.

Obviously I head back to my old hunting grounds every once in a while, and when doing so I specifically pick dates in order to fit in as many hockey games as possible. This year I managed to get my dose away at Bofors and at home against Borås. Woooo-fucking-hooo! Honestly, we must get back up to Elitserien. I imagine the agony I feel by living here is matched by the agony people feel living at home and having to face these games every week. No disrespect meant for our opponents, but I don't feel we belong here.

Now, with Kvalserien just about coming up, I've had to dip into the funds and make an investment in order to dampen this agony a little bit. I have bought a device that will enable me to watch the games on a TV whereas it's actually on the computer. I know this is nothing new, but as my laptop is not having a s-video/video out and I only possess an old 'normal CRT TV, I've had to find this thingeemajhiggi. I bet it's rubbish, but at least I can feel a little bit more normal screaming at the TV rather than at a small laptop in the corner.

Save me!

Other than that, my jersey is washed, the beer is on the cooling and I have the dosh to splash out on a couple of bottles of bubbly should that be needed. What else have I forgotten?

How Not to do Marketing

The clubs in Allsvenskan were rewarded with a better TV deal than ever when they signed with Viasat before the start of this season. The clubs are rumoured to recieve something in the region of SEK 1-1.2 million for the rights to broadcast the games.

Viasat in turn has an agreement with the Schibstedt Concern, who among other publications owns Aftonbladet, the biggest tabloid in the country (the paper is also the most visited website in Sweden). Schibstedt has also a fairly new online pay-per-view sports channel in S24.se, the Viasat agreement allows S24 to broadcast a number of games from Allsvenskan on their portal. Viasat has their own PPV service with viasatondemand.se, this unlike S24 is however geographically resticted to Sweden (and possibly Finland - but I am unsure of this).

This has worked well, or at least as well as expected from live online TV broadcasting.

However, last week S24 announced that, due to the economical difficulties faced by AIK, they would donate SEK 10 per ticket bought by AIK fans to view the away game against Bofors IK (AIK won 5-2).

For a media company they do surprisingly not seem to understand the impact of this action - they probably thought they'd come across as nice and helpful with this token gesture. Bofors was of course incensed by this move. AIK supporters who might have come to watch the game are now told they will help the club economically by watching it on the web, hence Borfors losing money from the gate and sale of refreshments. Other clubs and fans are asking how a company supposed to cover the games unbiased are allowed to sponsor one team and not the others.

Supporters from Växjö has rallied around calling for a boycott of the channel, and as Växjö fans are apparently buying most tickets for the online games, this can have unwanted implications for S24.

A supposed representative for S24 has posted a message on different boards explaining their decision. The amusing thing is that some of the claims in the message do not add up.

1. This is part of an ongoing drive to help all individual clubs.
2. Other teams are occasionally given five free codes to offer fans.
3. Other teams has been offered this type of arrangement before, but none have as yet been inclined to accept.

Blahblahblah. Corporate bullshit at its worst! Let's look a bit closer. 

1. That sounds all good, but uncharacteristically  charitable for a profit making company. But hey, each to their own! 

2. It is a slightly different matter to give consumers a freebie than to pay money into the account of the club they support. The clubs provide S24 with a good channel in which to directly source customers. I can't see the clubs rejecting this (unless they are hosting the game and might lose money on people staying in) and it increases the awareness of the company as far as S24 would be concerned. This 'cost' would fall under marketing - this is a known and tried formula they use. Normal marketing - no problem. 

3. This is where it sounds odd. Are they asking people to believe any club would have turned down the prospect of getting free money? I can bet you both my balls and a bluberry pie that this has never happened. I make a good blueberry pie by the way.

The facts are very simple. S24 are not making money and need to sell more than they have so far. AIK has many fans (that few care about ice hockey is another issue) and as so few go to watch the games, S24 simply see this as an untapped part of the market that they want in on. The general idea was most likely that they would get some publicity through this move - at least Aftonbladet ran with it (surprise!) and AIK fans knowing the club is needing all the money they can get, might just start watching the games online - and hopefully more than just this once. I can't see that this move put more than a few hundred in the AIK coffers, why this is in practical terms means that S24 just shat in their own handbag for no good reason.

The clubs have sold the TV rights and should not be expecting any more money than they have already received. But maybe due to the ill thought out move by S24, they might be in line for a small additional contribution as they will be forced to do this for the other teams as well. Thank you!

Hockey wants to be Free!

Tonight I am taking another - hopefully the final - step in my long and hard search to bring viasatondemand to my computer. Due to rights issues there is no possibility of watching the stream from a IP based abroad. With Swedish proxies being hard to find/rubbish/unsuccessful in getting through the system at viasat, I have had an agonising time this season. Funnily enough s24 - the other channel streaming hockey, has no rights issues with my not living within the borders of the country. That they are crap is a completely different matter. Not that I expect viasat to be any different...

Regardless, I hope for a major breakthrough this evening. A little bit of tweaking, a few adjustments, a bit of this-and-that with a good helping of luck, I'll be sitting through just over two hours worth of buffering and pixelated stuttering. Life is good in Allsvenskan!

 

And I'm not even charging you for it!