50 million people watching, 4K, VR pitched: United States NBC broadcast Rio-Rio Olympic Games, live TV stations-IT information
For NBC, this year's report shows the rapid changes in the media of the Olympic Games. This station just won the silver medal in prime-time television ratings: Olympic TV ratings sometimes reached double digit decline.
But if network streaming media won the gold medal, it is exaggerated: online viewership grew, but experience was not so good, can not replace traditional television experience.
This is not to say there's no concern about the Olympic Games--Phelps, bolt, Redkey became United States topic of national character.
But due to some reasons, like NBCUniversal Steve Burke (Steve Burke) had predicted, the younger viewers may also remain in the "Facebook bubble" or "Snapchat bubbles" – usually on the TV to watch the Olympic program has fewer people.
A major shift is happening
Now, in the aftermath of the Olympics, NBC clearly realized that a major shift is taking place.
"We are still learning and trying," make·lazhalesi, Chairman of the NBC Sports Group (Mark Lazarus), said in a telephone interview, "is still in the testing phase, but there are so many platforms, we will learn some lessons and prepare for the future. ”
This "future" is not four years later, but now. In some cases, NBC broadcast streaming programs on the Internet must be more important than its broadcast during the prime time TV show. This year's Olympic Games shows that the results were pretty good-practices-the key now is to find the best use of it.
In Rio during the games, NBC's live streaming video works means a lot. Media centers in Rio, a huge map showing all kinds of videos-these videos are passed in by the Olympic broadcasting services (Olympic Broadcasting Services), shoot, share with media partners – and then NBC put the video back to the United States to carry out complex operations.
In order to provide support to Rio's staff, NBC Sports Group at Stanford University takes up a lot of sites to carry out "ground crew". Headquarters of the group usually has hundreds of employees, but during the two-week competition has sent more than 1100 people for it. Companies have to put so many people in three different hotels with shuttle.
Their efforts to ensure that the network video stability and--this is the NBC for the third time in a row every minute video webcasts of Olympic events. For Web projects, this was a considerable success.
NBC said a variety of digital platforms, it obtained 100 million unique users, a figure than the London 2012 Olympics has soared to 29%, although this is the total number of online access, not just the number of streaming media. And that 50 million people to watch Olympic video online this year, up 109% from previous Olympic Games.
Live video min total flow (2.71 billion minutes) are soaring. This year 42% streaming video on the Internet TV or set-top box to watch.
Streaming media being bad review
Executive Vice President of StreamingMedia.com Dan·leiboen (Dan Rayburn) said that they tracked online audience for the games show bad reviews, most of which belong to streaming media services "business as usual".
"Sometimes users experience authentication issues, you must verify through Verizon, it's not NBC's problems," says Raeburn, "start the service when buffering this show always makes people feel helpless, sometimes half the browser crashed, and different browsers is not the same. ”
Currently online viewing experience was basically a bad review--user requires more than just you push into their digital video screen, but to really watch with satisfaction.
Have a user who says, recorded the game on the East coast there is a one-hour delay, there is a four-hour delay on the West Coast, it's very "ridiculous". At the time of the London Olympics, after the delay happens to coincide with the normal viewing hours and audience, and Rio and the East Coast time zone difference of just one hour.
NBC Sports Olympics experience on the Apple TV isn't very good. During the games, Olympics content has multiple options for this application. Some of the options are "live", some marked with "upcoming", there are also special sections, such as baobo·kesitasi (Bob Costas) to the ruian·luoqiete (Ryan Lochte) event reports and commentaries. Lochte won the gold medal at the Olympics, also falsely reported he was drunk, however, said he was a gun scandal lost a sponsor endorsements.
But some programs directly from the original video of Olympic broadcasting services delivered, while others are produced by the NBC Channel. You watch the "upcoming" video, results may see a still image display program will begin soon, even if it is Brazil at midnight. And you see the Channel Guide, see the schedule of the Olympic Games. Most importantly, the service does not have PIP (picture picture) option, so you can't open other Windows to watch another show, can't decide if I want to change the channel. You must first exit the current program, returned to NBC Sports in the application's main menu.
TV ratings are still key
Then there is the social media, are often considered to be accessories for TV and online streaming media, but in fact their increasing component--such as, Twitter provides full streaming of NFL games this year.
Throughout the Rio during the games on NBC is also active in Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, and BuzzFeed cooperation, create content on Snapchat. But some of the content is cut off, and some key moments from a closer look. And they're on Facebook and YouTube videos play only a maximum of 45 seconds, then slide prompts viewers to the NBC show.
Essentially, in NBC's picture outside the pay wall has been treated differently. Even if it is internal services, sometimes that happens.
NBC's meaning is quite clear: If you really want to watch the Olympics, you should really watch it on TV.
"TV is still our biggest platform, streaming media is an important part," Lazarus said.
In the short run, this method works very well. On the traditional TV, NBC still wants to see the Olympics, because that can generate revenue. During the Olympics, NBC's advertising revenue is only 10% from the network.
"We have high CPM indexes on the Internet than on TV," Lazarus said. "But the scale is a major problem. Television viewers a much larger, and I believe that will be so in the future for a long time, marketers focused on size. So for the foreseeable future, our main source of income or on TV. ”
Second, although fewer viewers than expected, ad buyers are still very happy with NBC is said to have advertising. If it is enough to entice them to purchase advertising for future Olympics, NBC has been satisfied. NBC has won the 2020 Olympic Games broadcast rights and fees that have been paid the IOC $ 7.75 billion, won the exclusive rights to the Olympic Games from 2022-2032.
Raeburn set-top box does not become the mainstream program to watch the Olympic Games, because the number of users is relatively small, do not have economies of scale.
Streaming media, 4K and virtual reality technology
Still, NBC still more efforts on the streaming video and other advanced technology experiments were carried out, and hoped to achieve diversification in the digital realm. In May, NBC said it would use the real time streaming media technology to provide to other media partners "Playmaker Media" service.
The significance of this service is that after years of games streamed practice, when NBC decided to not host the Olympic Games and the NFL, using its expertise in this area in order to earn income.
This is a smart move, before United States major league baseball MLBAM will take such an approach, has now grown into end-to-end video streaming service on the market leader.
NBC executives did not disclose the "Playmaker Media" partner who but the International Olympic Committee, is said to have reached a number of agreements, will soon disclose details.
"Actually this technology is already available, NFL items it before and we can do the same," NBC Sports Vice President Eric Black (Eric Black) said. "Their infrastructure are the same. ”
Lazarus points out that NBC already offer 4K streaming, and is testing virtual reality (VR) programs, although he was not particularly optimistic about them. There is a small amount of on-demand video of the Olympic Games is 4K, but Lazarus thinks their cost-effectiveness is not cheap. "I think that, with the passage of time, 4K, ultra HD is mainstream with the HDR format, but from the efficiency point of view, do not mature," he said.
Although he said his VR game feels good, but VR is still "a bit shaky, and wearing a helmet and watch TV is not very convenient."
Try different methods
So, what does this technology mean for future games? What does this mean for the future of NBC Olympics coverage? In Rio during the games, NBC has lost some viewers, but television ratings continue to be its most important indicators.
NBC's online video viewership has skyrocketed, but still not like TV to make money. Some executives believe social media is still at this stage "is mainly engaged in marketing", give more weight to some other executives to social media, which diverged some young media consumers.
Whether online streaming, Snapchat, or immersive VR video, give it a try in various ways, which methods can use which approach--the media often uses this strategy. However, if this year's Olympics telecast proved anything, it is this: even on TV shows, people can not see, no matter how hard you try to encourage them to look at.
The Olympic Games showed that "second screen" content may no longer be the second screen, which means NBC needs a new way to treat the second screen--not repackaged video clip, or broadcast on YouTube like 45 seconds, but developed specifically for the new platform, but also to make satisfaction.
"What role does social media play? Streaming video will bring to our prime-time TV show what kind of impact do? Our strategy remains to be seen, "Lazarus said.
Now the 2018 Winter Olympics has two more years of time, from the Tokyo Olympics in 2020 there four years, and NBC needs to make a choice. During this time, many things can change, but the biggest problem is that NBC will fully embrace this change.
5000万人观看、4K、VR齐上阵：美国NBC直播里约
奥运会有一手 - 里约
奥运会,直播,电视台 - IT资讯
对于NBC来说，今年的奥运会报道展示了传媒界的快速变化。这家电视台仅仅赢得了黄金时段电视收视率的银牌：奥运电视收视率的下滑幅度有时达到了两位数。
但是如果要说网络流媒体获得了金牌，那也是言过其实了：在线收视率虽然有所上升，但网络体验并不是那么好，取代不了传统的电视体验。
这并不是说大家没有关注奥运——菲尔普斯、博尔特、雷德基都成为了美国全国性的话题人物。
但是由于一些这样那样的原因，就像NBCUniversal的史蒂夫·伯克（Steve Burke）所预测的那样，年纪较小的观众可能还停留在“Facebook泡沫”或“Snapchat泡沫”中——想在通常电视上观看奥运节目的人减少了。
重大转变正在发生
现在，在奥运会结束之后，NBC清楚地意识到，一个重大的转变正在发生。
“我们还在学习和尝试，”NBC体育集团的董事长马克·拉扎勒斯（Mark Lazarus）在接受电话采访时表示，“现在仍然在测试阶段，而且有这么多平台，我们将会学到一些经验教训，为未来做好准备。”
这个“未来”并不是四年之后，而是现在。在有些时候，NBC在网上播放的流媒体节目必须比它在黄金时间播放的电视节目更加重要。今年的奥运会表明这种做法的效果还不错——现在的关键就是找出它的最佳使用方式。
在里约奥运会期间，NBC开展的实时流媒体视频运作有很重大的意义。在里约的媒体中心里，一幅巨大的地图显示了各种各样传入的视频——这些视频都是由奥林匹克广播服务公司（Olympic Broadcasting Services）拍摄的，分享给媒体合作伙伴——然后NBC把视频传回到美国，开展复杂的运作。
为了为里约的工作人员提供支持，NBC体育集团在斯坦福大学占了一块不小的地盘开展“地勤”工作。该集团总部通常拥有几百名员工，但在两周的比赛期间有1100多人可供它差遣。公司不得不把这么多人安排在三个不同的酒店，用班车接送。
他们的努力保证了网络视频的稳定和连续——这是NBC连续第三次实现在网上播放奥运项目的每一分钟的视频。对于网上项目来说，这是一个相当可观的成功。
NBC说，在各种数字平台上，它获得了1亿独立用户，这个数字比2012年伦敦奥运会飙升了29%，尽管这是在线访问的总人数，不只是看流媒体的人数。而且今年有5000万人在线观看了奥运视频，比上届奥运增长了109%。
视频直播分钟总数流（27.1亿分钟）更是大大飙升。今年有42%流媒体视频是在互联网电视或者机顶盒上观看的。
流媒体遭到的差评
StreamingMedia.com执行副总裁丹·雷伯恩（Dan Rayburn）说，他们在网上跟踪了观众对奥运节目的差评，其中大多数在流媒体服务中都属于“家常便饭”。
“有时用户会遇到身份验证问题，比如你必须通过Verizon的验证，这不是NBC的问题，”雷伯恩说，“启动服务，缓冲节目的时候，总是会让人感到无奈的，有时看到一半浏览器就崩溃了，而且不同浏览器还不一样。”
当前的在线视觉体验基本上都遭到了这样的差评——用户需要的不仅仅是你把数字视频推到他们的屏幕上，而是要真正让人满意地看节目。
有个用户说，比赛录播在东海岸有一个小时的延迟，在西海岸有四个小时的延迟，这真是非常“荒谬”。在伦敦奥运会时，延迟之后正好与观众的正常观看时间相吻合，而里约和东海岸的时区相差仅仅一小时。
NBC体育的Apple TV应用上看奥运节目的体验也不怎么好。奥运期间，该应用提供的奥运内容的有多个选项。有些选项是“直播”，有些标有“即将播放”，还有一些特别栏目，比如鲍勃·科斯塔斯（Bob Costas）对瑞安·罗切特（Ryan Lochte）事件的报道和评论。罗切特在本届奥运会上赢得了金牌，然而他也因酒后报假案称自己被枪指的丑闻而痛失了赞助商的代言。
但是有些节目是直接从奥林匹克广播服务公司传输过来的原始视频，而其他一些是由NBC频道制作过的。你选择观看“即将播出”的视频，结果可能会看到一个静止图像，显示节目不久将开始播放，即使当时是巴西的半夜。而且你也看不到频道指南，看不到奥运会的时间表。最重要的是，这个服务没有PIP（子母画面）选项，所以你不能同时打开其他窗口看另外的节目，无法决定是不是要换频道。你只能先退出当前节目，回到NBC体育应用的主菜单里。
电视收视率仍是关键
再有就是社交媒体，往往被认为是电视和在线流媒体的附属品，但实际上它们的分量在日益增加——比如，Twitter今年提供了NFL比赛的全程流媒体播放。
在整个里约奥运会期间，NBC也活跃在Twitter、Facebook和YouTube上，还和BuzzFeed合作，创建了Snapchat上的内容。但有些内容是剪切过的，一些关键时刻无法细看。而且他们在Facebook和YouTube上的视频最多只播放45秒，然后就用幻灯片提示观众到NBC上去看节目。
从本质上说，在NBC的付费墙之外的画面遭到了区别对待了。即使是内部服务，有时候也有这样的情况。
NBC的意思表达得很清楚：如果你真的想要看奥运，你就应该到真正的电视上看。
“电视仍然是我们最大的平台，流媒体也是一个重要组成部分，”拉扎勒斯说。
从短期来看，这种方法效果很好。NBC仍然希望人们在传统电视上看奥运节目，因为那可以产生收入。在奥运会期间，NBC的广告收入仅有10%来自网络。
“我们在网上的CPM指标比在电视上高，”拉扎勒斯说。“但规模是个重大问题。电视观众的规模大得多，而且我相信，在今后很长一段时间内都会如此，营销人士看重的是规模。所以在可预见的未来，我们主要的收入来源还是电视。”
第二，尽管电视观众比预期的少，据说广告买主仍然很满意NBC播放广告的方式。如果这足以吸引他们购买今后奥运会的广告，可能NBC就已经心满意足了。NBC已经获得了2020年奥运会的转播权，并已支付了国际奥委会77.5亿美元的费用，获得了从2022到2032年间奥运会的独家转播权。
雷伯恩觉得机顶盒方式不会成为奥运会节目观看的主流，因为那种用户的数量相对比较少，不具有规模效益。
流媒体，4K和虚拟现实技术
尽管如此，NBC仍然在流媒体视频上倍加努力，并且开展了其他一些先进技术的实验，希望在数字领域实现多样化。今年5月，NBC表示将使用实时流媒体技术来为其他媒体合作伙伴提供“Playmaker Media”服务。
这个服务的意义在于，经过多年的奥运会流媒体播放实践，NBC决定在不举办奥运会和NFL的时候，也利用自身这方面的专业知识来赚取收入。
这是一个聪明的举动，之前美国职棒大联盟的MLBAM就采取这种做法，现在已经成长为端到端视频流媒体服务市场上的领军者。
NBC的高管没有透露“Playmaker Media”的合作伙伴除了国际奥委会还有谁，只是说已经达成了几个协议，很快就会披露详情。
“实际上这项技术已经是现成的了，它和之前我们做到的NFL项目大同小异，”NBC体育集团副总裁埃里克·布莱克（Eric Black）说。“它们的基础设施是一样的。”
拉扎勒斯也指出，NBC已经在提供4K流媒体，而且正在测试虚拟现实（VR）节目，虽然他不是特别看好它们。有少量点播式奥运视频是4K格式，但拉扎勒斯认为其成本效益不划算。“我认为，随着时间的推移，4K、超高清与HDR一起将是会主流格式，但目前从效益方面来看，这么做还不成熟，”他说。
虽然他说，他自己用VR看比赛的感觉很不错，但VR仍然“有些摇晃，而且戴着头盔看电视不是很方便”。
尝试不同的方法
那么，这些技术进步对于未来的奥运会意味着什么呢？这对NBC未来的奥运会报道意味着什么呢？在里约奥运会期间，NBC已经流失了一些电视观众，但电视收视率仍然是它最看重的指标。
NBC的在线视频收视率一路飙升，但仍然无法像电视那么赚钱。一些高管认为，社交媒体目前阶段仍然是“主要是在搞营销”，另外一些高管则对社交媒体更加看重一些，认为它分流了一些年轻的媒体消费者。
无论是在线流媒体、Snapchat内容，还是沉浸式的VR视频，各种方式都试一试，哪些方法能行就用哪些方法——媒体常常都会采用这种战略。但是，如果说今年的奥运会转播证明了什么事情，那就是：即使电视上有节目，人们也可以不看，无论你多么努力地鼓励他们去看。
这次奥运会表明，“第二屏”内容可能不再仅仅是第二屏，这意味着NBC需要采取一种全新的方式来对待第二屏内容——不再是重新包装视频片段，或者在YouTube播放45秒之类，而是专门针对新的平台开发内容，而且要让观众看得满意。
“社交媒体发挥了什么样的作用呢？流媒体视频会给我们的黄金时间电视节目带来什么样的冲击呢？我们采取的策略效果还有待观察，“拉扎勒斯说。
现在距2018年冬季奥运会还有两年多的时间，距2020年东京奥运会还有四年时间，NBC需要做出选择。在这段时期中，很多事情都可能发生变化，而最大的问题在于：NBC是否会全力拥抱这种变化。