MLBAM Makes All Games Available For Streaming On Apple Devices

MLB At Bat Currently No. 1 On iTunes Among Paid Sports Applications

MLBAM’s move this week to begin live mobile streaming of its entire schedule to the iPhone and iPod Touch as part of the MLB.com At Bat application is being positioned as a key step toward a more platform-agnostic approach to selling content, said company President & CEO Bob Bowman. With the full slate of games becoming available on the Apple Inc. devices, MLBAM linked the MLB.com At Bat application to its existing MLB.TV out-of-market subscription service, with users needing to purchase both to watch every available game. The MLB.TV subscription currently costs $49.95-69.95 for the rest of the season, while MLB.com At Bat, currently No. 1 on iTunes among paid sports applications, costs $9.99. “The approach we’re taking here is that people who are MLB.TV subscribers now have the option of taking this wherever they want, provided they also buy the application, and the other way around. And this, we think, is a real move toward being platform agnostic,” Bowman said. “It’s also a precursor to what we’ll do next year where we intend to have people simply tell us what content they want, almost like people checking off a sign-up sheet, and we then can tell them how much it costs" (Eric Fisher, SportsBusiness Journal). More Bowman: "The importance of new revenue is de minimis compared to getting our content in front of the next generation of fans" (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 7/22).

A BIGGER BITE OF THE APPLE: The live-game rollout follows through on plans announced last month in conjunction with the release of the 3.0 iPhone and iPod Touch operating system and the new iPhone 3GS. More than 210,000 people have purchased MLB.com At Bat to date, while MLB.TV garners nearly a half-million subscribers. It is unknown how much those numbers will change as a result of the full schedule of live games becoming available. “We’re at the beginning of something here, and it’s clear we’ll need to go through a process to educate people," Bowman said. "Where we have some overlap (between MLB.com At Bat and MLB.TV), there certainly will be early adopters of this.” Such linkage between wired and wireless content is also being pursued by ESPN in certain instances, and also DirecTV with the SuperFan component of its NFL Sunday Ticket subscription package, with other major sports properties and networks expected to follow suit. Non-MLB.TV subscribers who purchase the MLB.com At Bat application will receive one live game per day, selected by MLBAM and rotated among all 30 teams. In-market streaming is not part of this effort, as that would require a dedicated deal with a local team and RSN and mobile streaming is not part of the current in-market initiatives with the Yankees and Padres. Users will be authenticated using the company’s patented geotargeting technology (Fisher).

Bowman Says MLB.com Sees Almost 100 Million Page Views Per Day

IT'S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD: MLBAM President & CEO Bob Bowman appeared on CNBC's "Mad Money" last night, where he discussed the growth of MLB.com and mobile consumption. CNBC's Jim Cramer called MLB.com "the best application I've seen." Cramer: "If you want to see the future of the mobile Internet then you have to go to MLB.com. … This is a Web site that is a 1,000 times better than television as far as I'm concerned." Cramer asked Bowman, "How far ahead are you of what everybody else will be doing and do you believe in my thesis given that this mobile Internet is the biggest thing?" Bowman replied, "I think wireless is. We got blessed with a visionary commissioner 10 years ago to set up the business. We got blessed with great content … and now the explosion of technology and a generation that wants it this way." Bowman noted MLBAM sees almost 100 million page views per day for MLB.com, with 30 million of those from wireless devices." Bowman: "Thirty percent of our visits right now are on an iPhone, on a Blackberry, on a regular old dump phone that can get to the Web site, whatever it is." That is up from just 8% two years ago. He added that in two years, MLBAM will have "more wireless page views than wired page views on MLB.com. It won't even be close. Well over 50% will be accessed by the mobile web." Bowman also noted MLBAM has yet to go public because the "only reason to go public is you need capital or you're trying to pay people off who've invested." Bowman: "We don't need capital. We have patient owners, we have long view owners, and it's really helped us get where we are by being private" ("Mad Money," CNBC, 7/21).