Why is illegal streaming so popular?
VloĆŸit
- Äas pĆidĂĄn 15. 02. 2023
- Try The Athletic for FREE for 30 days: theathletic.com/tifofootball
đ Tifo's new book, "How to Watch Football" is now available internationally: linktr.ee/tifobook
The illegal streaming of football matches remains a problem for the football industry and there are few signs that thatâs about to change. But why is illegal streaming so popular? And why is it even an option?
Tifo conducted its own survey, alongside industry research to find out why football fans illegally stream, and what the authorities are doing about it.
Written by Seb Stafford-Bloor, illustrated by Craig Silcock.
Follow Tifo Football:
Twitter: / tifofootball_
Facebook: / tifofootball
Instagram: / tifofootball_
Listen to the Tifo Football podcast:
The Athletic UK: bit.ly/TifoPodChannel
Apple Podcasts: bit.ly/TifoFootPod
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/06QIGhq...
Watch more Tifo Football: Tactics Explained: âą Tactics Explained | Ti...
Finances & Laws: âą Finances & Laws | Tifo...
Tifo Football Podcast: âą Tifo Football Podcast
Most Recent Videos: âą Most Recent Videos | T...
1 Popular Videos: âą Popular Videos | Tifo ...
About Tifo Football:
Tifo loves football. We create In-depth tactical, historical and geopolitical breakdowns of the beautiful game.
We know thereâs an appetite for thoughtful, intelligent content. For stuff that makes the complicated simple.
We provide analysis on the Premier League, Champions League, La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga, World Cup and more.
Our podcasts interview some of the gameâs leading figures. And our editorial covers football with depth and insight.
Founded in 2017 and became a part of The Athletic in 2020. For business inquiries, reach out to tifo@theathletic.com.
Music sourced from epidemicsound.com
Additional footage sourced from freestockfootagearchive.com
#Streaming - Sport
Quick answer: cause itâs free
Mindblown..
Forreal, like there was no need to make this video đđ
Thanks krillin
Oh...and cable is a total rip-off.
well actually we are already paying the internet
In Australia you need to pay $25 a month for the premier league, along with an extra $20 for the UCL and that doesnât even cover other cups and the domestic league which are all on seperate channels. Itâs easy to see why illegal streams are so popular, because we get charged so much.
Yup, its actually maddening when you add up how much it costs to watch your Premier League team play in all competitions, and to watch them live you're up at some ungodly hour for kick offs. Throw this on top of your other streaming subs like Netflix that don't have any live sports.... $$$
I appreciated that SBS gave us all World Cup games for free on free to air TV and via their website. Ahhh I miss the days where SBS had the Premier League rights (yes I'm that old lol)
Optus Sport is worth it compared to Sky though, and we can watch all games live, UK cannot
Optus used to have both ucl and prem for $15 a month or for free if you were an optus customer.. their failure to resecure ucl rights lost them a lot of customers and then they increase prices to compensate
not to mention fa cup is only on paramount+ and efl cup is only on kayo/foxtel lol
Do you actually watch ALL the games though? Understandable if you don't support a big club and want to be able to watch every Bournemouth match (for example). But since I can't watch all games live, I usually watch the replay on Foxtel which I have sub for, usually replayed within 12hrs at a better time for me
ÂŁ75 for me in the uk to get sky+sky sports + bt sport so i can watch epl and ucl
Have a few ideas:
1. In the UK they charge an unbelievable amount and itâs on all different services. The video says how much Sky missed out on due to illegal streaming, but imagine how much they made charging ridiculous prices every month for a couple of matches.
2. Iâm in the US now and ironically think itâs easier and cheaper to watch the Prem from here - I paid $20 for a year of peacock and can see all the Saturday 3pm games - itâs crazy I feel like I have better access to the prem now Iâm living abroad.
Although in the US, it's annoying to have to subscribe to both NBC and Peacock in order to watch all games
I have the middle tier of Peacock and Iâm pretty sure itâs like 30-50% of EPL games are available.
$20 a year? Jesus, Iâve just just paid the equivalent of $40 to BT to watch the champions league and Europa league games for the month.
Same my Dad in Africa watches all premier league games for less than 20$ a year
@@poogt22 i watch for $60 a year here in Africa
Would be interesting to see how these so called "losses" were calculated. If the free option wasn't there I imagine most people just wouldn't bother
A very good point!
"I'll just catch the highlights on CZcams" đ
@@TrillBill it really sucks but youâre exactly right! Aside from the last round (which was broadcast on like proper tv), thatâs how Iâve been watching all of the UCLđ
@@tonyjabroni7205 đ
When they say mean "losses in *potential* revenue. They are not interested in the long-term effects of having more people watch the games. They only care about the revenue they generate right now. This language only serves to manipulate public opinion into thinking they are being harmed more than they actually are
It's incredibly simple: I'm a student, I can barely pay for my living expenses, and a PL subscription costs almost 8% of my monthly income. I'm not too fond of streams, but I have no option. Also, this is why I'm skeptical of the calculations concerning how much the clubs "lose". Even if all the streaming sites were taken down tomorrow, I still couldn't afford a subscription.
well most people dont illegal stream because they cant afford it, they illegal stream because they are smart with their money. the calculation is based on the assumption that it is all shut down and the only way one can watch is subscribing. Students and people who are that broke are 10% of the population at the very most. Sizable, but the estimates are in the right range.
â@@SM16Basketball darling, that's just in first world countries, most people in the world can't afford the mismatch of subscriptions you need to have to watch your team, while having to pay bills, having other streaming services, buy food and etc, subscriptions to watch football can easily take 10% of the salary of a middle class person here so it's just not viable
@@luizansounds can confirm..
In India, streaming is fortunately not a luxury compared to other countries. Here is the break-up:
899 rupees for Premier League, cricket and F1 on Disney. That's around 10 dollars a year!
12 dollars a year for Champions League, Europa League, Bundesliga and Nations League on Sony.
14 dollars a year for MLS on Apple TV Plus.
La Liga, Ligue 1 and Serie A has FREE streaming via the local Reliance Jio Cinema app!
Total: 36 dollars a year for all the football you need!
Even I'm embarrassed to be paying so less....
AND I get to also watch CR7 and Al Nassr every week on Sony for less than 15 dollars a year! đ
A lot of people pay close to ÂŁ1k per year for Sky Sports, BT Sport and Amazon Prime so that they can watch their team, only to be denied because of the absolutely outdated idea that we shouldn't broadcast 3pm kick offs. That's why people look for illegal streams in that scenario.
Spot on
not to mention even its not at 3pm the broadcasters pick games to show so you aren't even guaranteed to watch your team
And up in Scotland you then have to pay for viaplay to get internationals and cup games
Itâs mental to me Iâd have an easier time watching my local team play in the prem if I lived in India than I do in the UK
Every Saturday it makes me laugh that BT can't show the first 15 minutes of a Serie A game until 5:15 because the authorities are terrified fans will sack off their own teams game because they'd prefer to stay at home to watch Lecce v Empoli instead.
It's mind blowing that in current year it's literally impossible to watch a lot of premier league games legally in the UK just because they kick off at 3pm on a saturday.
I agree. I've never understood this
Yeah it's farcical
Not just PL, any football on TV.
Why is that? Very strange
The reason is to encourage locals to go to the stadiums to watch it live
Completely ignoring that those streams are not actually as terrible as you describe, they often have very good quality, banner ads are only for stupid people without adblock and chats can be disabled. They are actually often more free of advertisments than "legal" alternatives.
True! The quality is actually very good when you know where to look đ
@@robinbaggio89 could you recommend sites with good quality please?
He is doing his role - Premier League marketing job using the usual mantras: streaming is theft, the image quality is bad, etc. This is not journalism, but advocacy (one of my most serious gripes about this channel, masquerading advocacy and opinion as journalism).
yeah stream with brave browser and you are fine..
however only issue that is have with this websites that it has a little delay(a minute and a half most time) but even that isn't a big problem
@@muaazkazia8953 sportlemon is okay. Start a recommendation thread below everyone >
One thing not mentioned is the lack of moral argument to go with the legal one. Few football fans would argue that the footballing establishment don't ruthlessly try to exploit us for every penny, seeing us as consumers far more than valued participants. Unlike the music industry where there's genuine arguments about the harms of illegal access, it's hard to say streaming is doing any real harm to any valued person within football. Premier league games are still very well attended.
Honestly, it feels like one tiny act of rebellion against the greedy and corrupt football industry.
amen, less money is what the sport needs, not more
Well said!
the music industry is worse. they pay the artist a much smaller cut than athletes get. in most cases sales and streams dont even make up for what the labels will charge an artist for production and promotion. The artist only turn a profit for themselves on merch and live shows.
The funniest thing is this BS argument that they have that goes along the lines of "we charge ÂŁ700/year for sky sports and 2million people stream illegally therefor we lose 1.4bn a year". No you don't. The vast majority of people wouldn't pay for the service if they couldn't steal it. The vast majority of people would also happily pay a resonable amount for a good service. You know, like Netflix used to offer a few years ago. Charge me ÂŁ20/month for all the football games and I will happily give you that. Charge me ÂŁ50+ and you won't see a penny from me.
@@drumagus2258 You forgot sync, which is one of the best revenue streams for artists these days.
It's interesting that lost revenue from illegal streaming is always discussed, when many folks who pirate sporting events simply wouldn't watch if that option didn't exist.
It's not a zero-sum game.
I'm definitely in that category. I really enjoy having the option, but am 0% ready to pay to watch the football I stream. There's too much money in top level football anyway.
This has been the case forever. A big number sounds better than a small number. A big number makes it seem like its a far more serious issue and makes them seem hard done by. They did the same when the discussion was about music piracy, film/tv piracy etc. When I used to rip computer games I had dozens of games I never even played. I had them in case I wanted to because it was so easy and quick to do. I wouldn't have bought 1/10th of the games I pirated. If I loved a game I bought it as well.
Reality is that if the price was reasonable, more people would buy it. Speaking of the UK here, you need different packages which include things other than football most of the time and even then there are many games not included (the 3pm + extras).
If they consolidated the games to one service and made the price lower than what it is now, they'd generate more revenue. The number of people paying less will be vastly outweighed by the number of people going from paying ÂŁ0 to something.
Exactly what I wanted to say before I saw your comment. Corpos desperately need to convince the court because then they can inflate the figures to the moon.
Agreed. As the video points out, streaming is often unreliable and poor quality, so people who really value it will pay for the subscriptions if they can afford it. Those watching illegally are likely to be only casually interested, or too poor to afford the subscriptions anyway.
On the other hand, I wonder how many people start off watching football illegally, then go on to pay for it. Or illegal streaming encourages them to invest in other ways, like buying merch.
The bit about the chat windows is so true lol, watching Modric spray the ball around while keeping my eye on a developing argument about eugenics
đ€Łđ€Łđ€Ł
ublock origin
đ the amount of times I've missed something due to a particularly volatile argument in the chat window đđ
Canât go 30 seconds in a chat without someone saying Pessi or Penaldo
@@narukami6364Twitter keyboard warriors fgs
The same thing happened with music piracy in the 2010s, when you may things easier to get, people stop pirating them. The fact is though, these streaming services are doing the complete opposite and having people pay monthly fees to each different service just to watch a certain competition. Does not make sense to do that when you have piracy streams for free and HQ.
That's it...I was baffled when I tried to acquire only one match and it was impossible to do...I had to buy the whole package or nothing. Went back to streaming
These companies are gonna be in for a big shock when they find out younger generations aren't gonna be willing to spend hundreds of pounds a month to watch football
they already understand it thats why theyre pushing the super league so hard
@@MattMajcan what? the super league has absolutely nothing to do with subscription costs. The super league will be just a new version of the Champions League, nothing else will change in European football
To be fair, younger generations aren't watching live sport in general though lol
@@GNMbg if the price maintains and the quality goes up, they will sell more subsribers. In super league you can have all top teams playing against each other, in UCL you get a Manu Barça match per decade.
@@kiroolioneaver8532 i think so too, many of them are just watching the Highlights on CZcams
*Hereâs a bright idea:* maybe make the prices reasonable so that people can actually pay for it and also put the top 3-5 leagues together on one platform so that we donât have to pay for multiple platforms.
Pirating will only die when these rich fuckers stop exploiting us consumers
No, that would be too easy and consumer centrist. These "smart" business, league and club people, need their private jets and champagne bootles.
@@sunrae3971 They will be the death of football.
I feel like there should be a UEFA subscription where you can pick a certain amount of leagues to have access to per month and it work that way.
They can even make it customizable, i.e. you pay for 3 leagues or 5 leagues and you can choose what those leagues are. I.e. I want EPL, Serie A and La Liga...and maybe you are allowed to change once a month, so the next month I decide, you know what..Vinicius Junior is not doing it for me, lets swap La Liga for Bundesliga.
but then the giant corporations that control most of our lives and society wouldn't be able to extract as much profit as possible from ordinary people! What you're proposing is, in the eyes of the rich, essentially socialism. Extremely bright idea, I concur, but it will never happen as long as maximizing profit is the main goal for all of these streaming services.
As a Scottish football fan living in the US, it is difficult to find many matches being broadcast in the league, let alone other competitions. But what is absurd is the fact that local Scottish fans canât even watch all matches televised, as many arenât even broadcast anywhere at all. And if there is a club-owned streaming subscription itâs only available to overseas viewers.
yup itâs really odd, i tried to find a channel showing the hearts game a few weeks ago and i found out it was only ppv on hearts website
As a Canadian, I like how the Australian Football League works. As someone previously frustrated by accessing quality streams, I was about to pay $200 for a Watch AFL subscription when I found out that if you buy an international membership for one of the 18 clubs you get the benefits of a membership (which includes getting an annual mail kits and voting privileges for the club) as well as a discount on the streaming service subscription saving at least $50 to get more. You lose the guilt of watching illegal streams and you get to directly support and form a relationship with your favourite club. Win/win.
I was gonna do this with the Lions, but then ABC's Asia Pacific broadcast service does air 5-6 games for free per week so I don't care too much about missing a game or two
In the UK at least, the answer is two-fold: the 3pm blackout and no consolidation of the market. Liverpool v Everton on Monday this week was shown on Sky. Wednesdayâs Man City v Arsenal was on Prime Video. Saturdayâs early KO will be on BT. The following Saturday fixtures at 3pm will be shown across the world, but not in the UK. If you want to follow the league completely, it is impossible to do so without illegally streaming some games, on top of forking out for three separate streaming services. Itâs a disgrace.
3pm kickoff time means Saturdays 5 match at the same time? Iam from india in here it's easy to watch pl in 4 different languages all games being broadcasted
exactly, unless the league and broadcasters move with the times, this is not going to change. I have sky, bt and amazon but still have to use illegal streams to watch football, whats the alternative? If Man Utd are playing and theyre not on TV, im 100% going to watch it online. Why should i miss my team play?
I'd argue the opposite. All those providers should be allowed show these matches equally, and you should get to choose which you prefer.
Competition supposedly negates the need for price fixing by driving down the price while improving quality, so let's have it then đ
â@@ronanfitzpatrick1261unfortunately the reality is that competition usually just drives up prices and drives down quality as the private sector looks for the cheapest and easiest way to make a big profit
@@benellis-moat6247 also, think about the fact that not every watches at top 6 team. How many times a year are Brighton or Wolves really on TV? 5/6 games. You basically would never watch your team unless they play every Sunday UK
I for one am so happy clubs themselves release their own highlights for the match, it could be released a bit quicker. But it's better than nothing. Almost gone are the days where you search for highlights and get only pictures or worse FIFA gameplay.
It still happens when you search highlights from the less-popular competitions...
@@amadearnas I try searching the Europa League final: No highlights đ
Romanian Superleague: Full highlights alongside clips on both the league's yt channel and tv channels with broadcasting rights yt channels, altough the league is litterarly in its worst shape since 1970 đŠŸđ
try hoofoot for extended football highlights almost instantly
LMAOOOOOOO THE FIFA GAMEPLAY AHAHHAA
Those people who release FIFA gameplay but dont mention it is. Are the worst humans alive
The lack of consolidation in the market is also a big issue like Iâd probably pay more money if I knew I were getting access to every single game during the season but each package only comes with a fraction of the games
Funniest thing is you donât need to watch a stream with dumb pop ups and ads etc⊠Lots of streams are readily accessible through social media live streams like Twitter. Which is a god send in all honesty.
Itâs all about the fire sticks my friend đ
Even the biggest, richest football CZcamsrs are forced to stream illegally because it's not just 3pm games that aren't available, there are loads of Premier League games that despite not being broadcast during the blackout, still aren't broadcast on British TV. It's mind bogglingly absurd that someone abroad can watch a game that isn't available to for someone in the UK. The rights system needs a total overhaul, it's completely broken as it is.
It's not just the cost, but not even going to argue about that because it needs to be AT LEAST 75% less expensive than it currently is, which will never happen, so I will never pay for it.
As someone living in the US, the quality of commentary makes a massive difference to me. I'd much rather watch an illegal stream where I listen to Gary Neville, Carra, Roy Keane, or anyone else from the Sky Sports crew than an American commentator who insists on explaining why a player must lie behind a free kick wall, EVERY SINGLE TIME THERE'S A FREE KICK
Because soccer isn't popular here and MLS operates illegally (that's a whole video worthy content), so they are assuming that you are watching soccer for the first time.
Big facts đđđđđŻđŻđŻ
@@maxscameraguy that's đ§ą
@@maxscameraguy I definitely understand that. It's just very frustrating to listen to the offside rule being explained for the thirtieth time when watching United vs City
Rare American W about Football
I think the big question to me is when the teams, broadcasters, etc say they are "losing" money on illegal streaming is - what percent of the people who are illegally streaming it otherwise would just not watch? If I am going to illegally stream something I could buy, its because I am interested in it, but am not interested enough to pay for it. Have to think at least on the team side, they would prefer some people watch illegally but still remain fans. On the broadcast side its a bit different, but if you create fans you might eventually get them to buy your product if they get to a financial place they can afford to.
*Sixteen of Arsenal's* thirty-eight league fixtures went untelevised this season, including matches against Manchester City, Liverpool, and Sp*rs. Of the sixteen, only two were made legally available for live streaming in the United States (those against relegated sides Leeds and Leicester). The choices being made by the rights holders reek of categorical incompetence; Moreover it costs them nothing for a consumer to seek alternative sources for a product they do not even offer.
Using words like illegal is a tool by big companies to scare you. It isn't illegal to watch and nobody has ever been prosecuted for watching.
@@NUFCOfficial
*Pretty sure it happens* in Qatar, the rightsholder being effectively a state-owned enterprise.
I find this very weird how the broadcast of one tournament is split amongst three different broadcasters in UK. Here in India, the entirety of the tournament is given to only one broadcaster.
Similar thing is happening with American football in the US. ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC altogether share the rights to NFL and college football.
Fox Sports and Apple both share the rights to the MLS. All games are available on the Season Pass package, and Sunday afternoon games would be carried on Fox or FS1.
In Portugal, the prices are just absurd when compared to the economical system we have.
I'm not a Benfica fan, but let's just imagine I wanted to watch every single game of them: I'd have to pay 10âŹ/month to watch Benfica's home games in the league, since they're only broadcasted on Benfica TV. Then, I'd have to pay 26âŹ/month to watch Benfica's away games in the league, since they're only broadcasted on Sport TV. On top of that, I'd have to pay 15âŹ/month for the Eleven Sports subscription, since they're the ones with the Champions League license.
I know you guys in England pay more money, but in this case, a Benfica fan would have to pay more than 600⏠per year, while the minimum wage in Portugal barely exceeds 700⏠per month. When you take into consideration that half the population here supports Benfica, it's pretty obvious why pirate streaming services are so common here. I pay for the Eleven Sports subscription because of the Champions League and the Bundesliga, but that's it.
In the UK if you don't want to watch the sky six then you're basically out of luck from a legal perspective. Should you watch your club play them then you'll be in for a trainwreck of bias
It may be similar in Portugal for lesser known teams
Edit: the sky six are the clubs that voted for the super League, so called because they get preferential treatment from TV (especially sky)
See, I'm from a country where nobody pays for anything online, but I live in the US now. One day, I decided to try doing things legally for once and got a one week trial for Sky sports.
Turns out.... The stream was constantly buffering (which barely happens on the websites I use).
Needless to say I won't leave the comfort of the illegal Arabic streams đ€Ł
You were in the US and decided to go for a Sky Sports stream? That was the problem right there lol
Better off trying ESPN, NBC, Fubo or bein for football in the states. Not sure what made you pick Sky
@@zerofox641 sky has better announcers đ€·đŸââïžđ€·đŸââïž
@@zerofox641 I know what made me choose SkySports: 30 hours without sleep đ the perfect recipe for rash and nonsensical decisions.
I have to say though that despite the fact that it was on SkySports, I would still expect a better experience there than on some random website. Heck, I was even able to find some SkySports stream that was mods stable than the one I had...
I heard good things about NBC. but don't you have to get different services for different leagues (NBC for EPL, ESPN for La Liga, CBS for UCL) ?
Arabic Streams đ€Č
Im late to the party but I think fragmentation is also part of the issue. If you want to watch all tournaments and matches you need multiple services, something that is not only expensive but also a leads to a fragmented user experience. The big advantage of most pirated streaming sites is simply that users can access all matches with a few clicks, while the legal route requires users to switch between different services with completely different Interfaces. In the music world services like Spotify made access to legal music so convenient that many people don't even bother pirating anymore. Same goes for gaming, platforms like Steam make access to almost any game fast and easy.
Im pretty sure if there would be something like UEFA Netflix, with different tiers of subscriptions, many pirates could be converted to legal subscribers.
So I say: Instead of crying and wasting money on lawsuits just make the damn experience of watching football good.
Youâre talking about a Netflix for football?
Between this and your video a few years back on how much the PL could make with itâs own streaming service itâs a pretty strong business case. Iâd love a more flexible subscription model; full sub, single team or single game purchases. Iâve recently started using NOW instead of sky and it means I can watch anywhere (with internet) on any device
Because the prices are too damn high nowadays, even to watch from home. I remember the days when the Champions League was available on free TV, and that wasn't that long ago, that was during the 2000s
Champions league was "free" like 4 years ago where I live now all these streaming services have ruined the way uefa and the top 5 leagues broadcast their matches
@@damnthatsfr5475 Where are you from?
@@lucaslonchampt613 the u.s., champions league used to be on fox, fox sports 1, 2 and espn but now they don't show any group stage games on tv and only one knockout game per matchday on cbs
@@damnthatsfr5475 similar thing in my country, couple years back you could watch CL and EL on national TV for free, with top 5 leagues on streaming services/cable. Then they got outbid by O2 TV for CL, but at least it was one streaming service that you need to pay for and you could watch CL and top 5 leagues. It's spread even more now and just gets pretty expensive to watch quality football with subpar commentating.
ITV Champions League football was the golden age. đđŸ
I think it's unlikely that illegal streaming costs the Premier League, in fact it is more likely the opposite. In the 1990s it was common to make illegal copies of computer programs. Microsoft had near 100% market share in China but made no revenue because it was all illegally copied. Microsoft decided against creating more robust keys/verification to stop illegal copying because it wanted to keep market share and knew that market share would lead to revenue in the future. Most people who illegally stream wouldn't pay for all content so the lost earnings are quite small. Not only that but it can lead to more revenue in the future, the poor student who illegally downloaded music 10 years ago now works and can afford to pay for a subscription to Spotify. Keeping market share keeps potential future customers, when people's circumstances change they will become paying customers in the future because 1) they can afford it and 2) the quality is better.
I think piracy does hurt. Future revenue is less valuable than current revenue and every company will prefer those revenues especially when the future revenue is like 10 to 20 years away when your costs are also on the rise. The market will eventually force sports broadcasting to better business models just like it did for the music industry through subscription services like iTunes.
Difference here is Spotify is affordable. I earn plenty enough to pay for these streams but can't justify it. I wouldn't be surprised if the proportion of illegal streams fell off a cliff if the price was ÂŁ30/mth, they showed all the games, they were all accessible from the same app and the stream was good quality
Fair point, also I honestly think less money would do football's soul good. Premier League clubs have plenty of money and so do sky and the rest of that lot. No sympathy ngl
This argument is nonsense. People have said this for years about music, but earnings from album sales have completely dried up. Piracy killed it. Spotify does not equal album sales. It is successful because people don't want to buy music, and because it pays artists an absolute pittence.
I'm not defending the football TV model, btw. I dislike it intensely, but the comparison with music is flawed.
@@devononair i think there is a good comparison to be made with music...although not for the reasons originally provided.
In the 90âs it wasnât possible to download music legally and conveniently. Simply put it was harder work to buy an album legally than it was to just download it. So sales fell.
However when iTunes came around there was a convenient and easy to use website where you could just download music legally and pay for it. Sales increased at that point.
I think a similar crisis is hitting football. Itâs simply put much harder to watch a game of football legally than it is to just watch it for free illegally. To watch a game you need to have the right provider, package and availability. You also have to subscribe often to features you donât want - and pay at a premium for doing so.
If there was an easy way customers could just order/buy the rights to watch any game they wanted individually, I suspect far more people would do it.
Here in Zambia you can pay the equivalent of about $25 a month for a satellite TV subscription which includes all the Premiership, La Liga, Serie A, and Champions League matches. Itâs still not affordable for a great many Zambians though.
EDIT: corrected the price.
Surely. I used to stream illegally online since there were no online streaming options in India until recently. And they allow you to stream at just $10 per year. Automatically, almost 90% of people I know shifted to legal online viewing.
In India, streaming is fortunately not a luxury compared to other countries. Here is the break-up:
899 rupees for Premier League, cricket and F1 on Disney. That's around 10 dollars a year!
12 dollars a year for Champions League, Europa League, Bundesliga and Nations League on Sony.
14 dollars a year for MLS on Apple TV Plus.
La Liga, Ligue 1 and Serie A has FREE streaming via the local Reliance Jio Cinema app!
Total: 36 dollars a year for all the football you need!
Even I'm embarrassed to be paying so less....
how do i do that in usa
That is only for PL. UCL is broadcasted on SonyLiv. LaLiga on MTV or Voot Select stream. No one's paying for 4 or 5 different streaming services just to watch 2-3 matches weekly.
@@Sujay95 do you know best websites to watch football
@@cnatical totalsportek is what I use when I'm not watching on TV.
Because I donât have to pay a dozens of streaming services to finally watch what I want to watch
Yeah it's kind of crazy that football hasn't came up with something like Spotify like the music industry did a decade ago
Football in the UK is ridiculously expensive. Most people cams afford BT and sky sports.
Iâm sure a lot of people would be very happy to pay 10-15$, god even 20$, monthly if you then get access to all leagues (EPL, Bundes, LaLiga, UCL Europa League etc) and it would work everywhere. But with leagues having agreements with various streaming services, regional restrictions that require you using VPN to access the stuff you are paying for, it just becomes easier to stream it illegally.
DAZN in Germany at the beginning was something like that. It had EPL, Serie A, La Liga, Ligue 1, also some smaller leagues and for Basketball the NBA. It was 9,99⏠a month. Since then they have lossed the EPL, bought some rights to the Bundesliga, the UCL and the NFL but now it costs 39,99⏠a month. This rise in price in a timespan of 7 years. It' ridiculous. And still in 2023 they stream in 720p. At the beginn mostly everbody loved DAZN here, now there mostly hated.
THIS^^. I want to watch football but Iâm not paying upwards of $100CAD (no currency jokes lol) a month after taxes to get access to every league. If the leagues werenât so siloed and the streaming services werenât so greedy it wouldnât be nearly as much of an issue
Not to mention on several cases, official third party partnership failed to guarantee their streaming quality for enmasses.
Here in my country, i still remember when the *national* company fcked up Final WC 2022 broadcast for whole 40 minutes and even still got laggy for next 20 minutes. No such thing happened with illegal *multinational* streams.
That alone rest my case as someone who still had effort for "being legit".
Part of the trouble with the cost is that even with three broadcasters it's still a monopoly. It's only competition if they show the same games and you can pick between them. It's a bizarre scenario when we were better off with Sky being the only broadcaster.
This. Instead of choosing the broadcaster who offers the best price or has the best commentators and experts, the viewer chooses which competition they want to watch, and if they want to watch matches from various competitions (so let's say they'd like the Top 4/5 and CL), they have to pay all of them, which makes the price ridiculous.
Iâve seen this compared to supermarkets. What if you could only buy oranges at one, milk at another and bread at another. Itâs not competition at all, itâs a monopoly.
The UK system is broken. When I lived in Sweden you could sign up for a monthly subscription of about ÂŁ5 per month and you'd have access to every single premier league match
No way, it's atleast ÂŁ50 per month.
It's more or less the same in Romania. My cable provider (whose TV monthly subscription costs 5-10 EUR depending on package) has 4 dedicated sports channels which show most big games from the Premier League, La Liga, Serie A and Bundesliga, plus the European competitions. Quality is great (HD and occasionally 4k) and commentators are also decent.
@@TLGProduktions In the Netherlands with Viaplay I pay âŹ10 per month and I can watch any game
I also have ESPN and Ziggo for Eredivisie and Champions League matches for an extra âŹ15 so pay âŹ25 per month for everything I want to see
That also includes Bundesliga, La Liga, Serie A, Ligue 1, Copa Libertadores and Europa League etc.
In the UK I used to stream illegally cause it was the best option with regard to cost and access
@@radupuhalschi7522 which tv is it? Just asking I'm not Romanian haha
@@islamiconasheed the company is called DIGI, they're a Romanian provider of cable TV, internet and phone.
My problem is that I only want to watch my team (Arsenal's) matches and I don't want to pay for the other 99% of sports content from the various platforms. If the Premier League took production in house and became streaming company like "Netflix" or "Prime", they could offer two packages, "Follow your team" which streams the 38 matches your team plays" and the complete season which was every game available. I'd pay the 20-50 quid a month for a service like.
I am in Canada and i am facing similar issues as well. I am subscribed to three broadcasters in order to watch European sports. DAZN had the rights to the EPL, FA and League cups, Europa and Champions league up until the 2021-21 season ended. FuboTV bought the rights only for the EPL (it is also the only broadcaster of the Portuguese league and Serie A). La Liga and F1 are exclusively shown on TSN which also had the broadcasting rights to the world cup. All these 3 subscriptions CAD $200/annually-DAZN, CAD $25/monthly or $200 for 8 months -FuboTV, and $200/annual-TSN combined cost $600 to "enjoy". If I want Bundesliga, that's another $200 with Sportsnet. If I bring in UFC pay-per-view now, I would run mad. Exclusive broadcasting doesn't make sense and no wonder why people pirate content, especially younger folks.
Illegal streaming doesnât necessarily mean its inferior quality. If you know where to look you can find a great quality stream with no intrusive ads or chat. Fact of the matter is until a more affordable package exists that covers all games in all competitions many people will continue to use pirate streamsâŠ
Yo whatâs a good stream site? Asking for a friend đ?
For research purposes we need links...
STOP DELETING THE LINKS TIFO
Please text me the links ser đ€Łđ€Ł
great quality stream with no intrusive ads or chat? I mean there are so many of them? which one? Just so I know how to avoid them :)
If the Premier League were to remove the 3pm blackout, reclaim its broadcast rights and stream all its matches live on its own service, then I think a lot more people would be willing to pay for it. Though it may sound cheap, if you charged ÂŁ10 a month, or the equivalent in local currency around the world, I think that you would probably have more legal worldwide subscribers than you do today, and the Premier League would get to keep all if it, rather than split it with broadcasters. A number of American sports use this model, and I think itâs about time the Premier League left television behind, as itâs fast becoming an antiquated medium. I know others are the same, but speaking for myself, I never watch broadcast television anymore, the rare exception being when Wolves are on TV, and even then Iâll just pay for a day pass and stream it on Now TV. Itâs all streaming for me now, with the on demand nature and lower cost far more appealing. This shift in viewing habits is well under way, and is something the Premier League should embrace.
numbers show that 30% of households dont even have a tv in their homes anymore these days. And that number has slowly going up. Most people watch through streaming services on laptops, Ipads, Phones.
Airing matches on TV has a very small reach. Where is streaming it through a proper services reaches billions globally. So even at a tenner a month being low...it is off set by a much larger user base.
Would likely be impossible under the UK's legal framework. Premier League rights are subject to heavy competition laws (you can thank Sky's competitors) - so the league would be unlikely to be allowed to do this domestically.
The blackout's there for a reason, why can't they just have pl games kick off at a different time?
I think it comes down to just a provider/service issue. If I could get every premier league game broadcast in high quality for a yearly sub of like ÂŁ200 or ÂŁ300 then I would. Instead I'm expected to pay over ÂŁ700 a year to not even be able to see every game. This is even worse when I mostly just watch my team's games anyway so I'd be having to pay ÂŁ700 when I'm not that interested in 80% of the other matches.
I think itâs important to remember that the cost of UK based customers illegally streaming 3pm Saturday games would only be felt by clubs if they saw a correlated drop in match day attendences; lost sponsorship and commercial value through forgone digital consumption isnât applicable here as there is only one product - physical attendance. Modelling a world where the blackout is taken away would be fascinating and understanding what legal products could support physically going to stadia so that everyone wins. Scarcity drives demand after all.
Look at how the music industry battled piracy of music.
They made options cheaper for people so that they can use spotify instead of illegally downloading music.
The rise of spotify is proof that if provided with a reasonable cheaper alternate, people will buy it instead of pirating.
See also: video games and steam
@@davidd8941 facts, Gabe did it best
Illegal streams is going up in every domain due to the streaming wars. I donât think any of these companies think about the average Joe. They just see a large pie and want a slice. Imagine paying for Netflix, prime, Disney plus , Apple Music and a butt load on a futball game. Lol ask me which Iâll choose. FREE every time of the week. VPN cost $3 a month
Yeah VPN costs so little comparing to having to pay 40-60⏠a month for all the streaming services lol
@The LIM Report Joe Devine is nowhere close to being average. His sultry voice sets him miles ahead of us. Sorry I thought this was Tifo IRL.
For the Caribbean, there's no easily accessible football package that would include all channels. Its all bundled separately since providers purchase exclusive rights (CBS the champions, NBC Premier, ESPN La liga)
Not only that, there's a region locked for many Caribbean islands to legally stream European football. Paramount, ESPN streaming platforms don't work well while Peacock being the notable exception. Not only that, Peacock doesn't stream all games of the Premier.
Piracy streams are the only viable way to get a glimpse of european football because even in CZcams the highlights are in some case region locked.
The "losses" in question are not losses when the viewer never ever would have or could have paid the subscription fee or attended the game in-person. It's only a true loss for the smaller percentage of the illegal viewers that would have or could have paid the fee but chose not to. And how many of those supposed losses were for Saturday 3pm games?
the worst is that instead of understanding that the prices they ask are too high, these platforms just keep on trying to hunt down streamers, with little to no result I would say
If the game isnât on TV in the UK but itâs on in the US your asking for it to be streamed
Here in South America , the pacakge we pay for TV comes with The Premier League + the other 4 leagues. Champions League which sounds as a great deal but the problem is that some matches you have to paid for Direct TV. For example , El clasico Barca vs Madrid is only viewed if you have that one , the domestic cups too , and some important match that might be played but no show due to the timing. For example the City vs Arsenal was consider a late game for PL standards and thus was not air on TV but only their highlights lmao.
I honestly had no idea it was so expensive to watch the Prem in the UK. I actually assumed it would be cheaper than the $25 CAD I pay a month in Canada.
In Greece to watch only just the domestic league, you have to be subscribed to two services with a minimum cost of around 50 or 60 euros. That's insane taking into consideration that matches were shown on the national TV channels which were free about 15 years ago.
Not to mention every olympiacos home game is streamed only on cosmote and cyprus that's the only platform to watch it on and its only available in Greece and every other team in the greek super league has more broadcasting rights around the world I miss it when they had the olympiacos games on nova sports atless we can access a subscription abraded
It's the same in Argentina, now it costs like 30 dollars a month *considering most people earn less than 200 dollars monthly*... while 10 years ago we had public TV that broadcoasted all matches of all clubs and it was so good being able to follow the teams you like + the teams of the province you live in...
Football is turning back into a posh entertainment rather than a game for the people, it's seen in every aspect of the game especially the transfers. I reckon it's cause of the still prevalent bidding system. Increased sponsorships (sometimes shady) leads to increase in player wages which leads to increase in TV rights to be on par with other sponsorships which in turn leads to higher cost of each subscription service. If the influx of money doesn't stagnate It's just going to increase with every passing day. On the other hand no player or team would want less money than what they already earn. Personally, I think a cap would help but it has to be incorporated all across the board or it wouldn't work. But as we've already seen in the years gone by neither FIFA nor UEFA can properly impose a financial strictness. So, I don't think the "legal" way is gonna get any cheaper any soon.
Growing up i remember watching champions league games in tuesday, europe league games in thursday and league games in saturday. Also including the champions league final and europa league final, all of of that on TV for free. Good times...
I remember watching that epic 2nd leg champions league semi final between Liverpool and Barcelona round a friends house who uses illegal live stream.
Missed the first goal and the 4th goal due to the connection going đ
One way to fix this is a cheap season pass for each team for fans to subscribe and watch their team in all competitions on one platform.
Yea and if you follow like 10 different teams like a lot of football enthusiasts you'd be burning your money
â@TacosTasteGood it should be an option , not a replacement. If you just want to watch the premier league then you could just subscribe to the league.
Yeah that should definitely be an option. I'm an everton fan and only really watch our games due to my timezone making it difficult to watch neutral games so if there was a more cost effective option to just solely watch one team that would be great.
@Tyson Gettens it could only work if the revenue doesn't just go to that one team. I could see it being a problem where you'd have the most popular teams generating significantly more money than the rest of the league, like what's happening in la Liga.
I agree
In Norway you pay 720 GBP a year to watch only the Premier League, excluding the domestic league and Champions League
Yes! Screw the premier league and screw Viaplay. It will never be worth it.
Christ! 720 GBP. My cousin lives in norway: he pay 90k GBP for a Volkswagen Toureg !!
Was looking for this, Viaplay are discriminating against us.
Piracy has been a problem for decades strangely until Netflix came along, it was big, dominant, everyone put their shows on one platform, everyone was making money hand over fist, from Netflix to studios to actors to anyone that gets residual money from them, then everyone got jealous and decided to start their own service and almost every streaming service is loosing money right now. Now the interesting thing is that when Netflix was at it's peak with no competitors, piracy of content was at it's lowest, people were cord cutting and ditching cable/satelite services, now with people being forced to sign on for multiple services and their total amount of money exceeding that of cable subscription, people are actually returning to cable and piracy is on the rebound and rising fast. There are lessons there to be learned here.
I know we're terrible to watch, and therefore not often picked as a televised game, but as a Southampton fan having had 1 of the last 8 weekend matches shown on UK TV wouldn't exactly encourage me to pay for 3 subscription services in the UK to barely watch my team. Fortunately where I live now it's 10 quid a month for every premier league match and I'm more than happy to pay.
Edit: this also goes for any of the other teams who doesn't happen to be in the sky 6
Because legal streams are overpriced. You get pushed away from your team by being charged absurd amounts to follow it, all based on the idea that it's somehow good for you because then the team has more money. It's getting to a point where I've been seriously considering taking some conscious effort to finally cut myself away from football because the relationship is so exploitative. Then there are the damn betting websites, the oligarchs and the dictators who are welcomed in the name of the "progress" brought by their dirty money.
When Netflix and Spotify came, for example, I'm pretty sure pirated movies and music took a significative hit, because they were priced in a range people could actually pay. This is mostly from a brazilian perspective and it does not surprise me that it extends to Europe and elsewhere.
The 3pm blackout in today's age is a very very outdated rule. To stop people watching on tele to "force ticket sales" doesn't work for everyone. I live in South UK, support man utd. There is no way for me to go to Manchester for a 3pm kick off. But if there was a package for me to watch the game for ÂŁ5 (even if it was a "virtual ticket" i.e VR from one seat/position in the stadium as an example). I am sure man utd/premier league/FA would prefer ÂŁ5 from probably hundreds of thousands of people than ÂŁ0 from hundreds of millions
Support yer local you dosser
@@oliverd8298 and what if your local club is playing on Sunday? Why can't one watch another match on a Saturday afternoon? The point still stands, the 3pm blackout is archaic.
@@JonathanMallett tough
@@oliverd8298 The other point is what if you've moved. If you lived in Manchester for 20 years lets say and moved to the South because of a job you don't suddenly start supporting Bournemouth instead do you? The costs and the blackouts are so stupid, but the TV deals are the reason we have the best players because the teams are making bank. It's a frustrating situation to say the least.
I couldn't agree more, the blackout is a joke and very outdated. I'd happily pay a monthly subscription to Liverpool to watch all of their matches. It's ridiculous you need multiple subscriptions to watch them legally yet I can't even see every match.
There needs to be an electronic season ticket for your team. That would solve the problem (plus get rid of the 3pm blackout). Id pay ÂŁ150-200 to watch all of my teams games. They did it in lockdown basically. It is totally doable right now for championship and orem and probs league 1 and 2 as well
The all or nothing approach is great for league revenue but in all honesty most fans arenât watching that many games a week, their should be options to pay to watch just teams that you want to
@@mobogdan4683 You could have a pay to watch fee that was like a ÂŁ5-7 ETICKET that would be per match with a discount if you brought the season ticket. Could make a online area for fans so they could interact and discuss the game as you watch it. It's not rocket science.
I dont blame anyone who does it, as a form of entertainment, sport has always been too expensive in comparison to normal television/movies. if you want to watch all football shown on tv, or only F1, or are an avid boxing or wrestling fan who pays for their respective PPV's, sport is very expensive. But football is the worst being divided up between networks and having blackouts. It makes no sense that other countries can more easily, and cheaply, watch all games than the country from which it originates
I wish everyone would stop streaming illegally so these footballers can start getting paid better
Said absolutely nobody ever đđ
God bless IPTV đđ
I know, those poor footballers are being robbed of millions each week. It's just awful for them, we should have a charity fundraiser or something.
@@Priority76 Pls do so, I don't want Kante leaving us he should be paid 700k aweek
Would love to see clubs broadcast their own games. As an Arsenal fan I care most about watching Arsenal games, surprising I know. This would most likely be much cheaper than my current sky, but, and prime subscriptions!
As a Villa fan I want to watch the club I support. However, that's almost impossible legally because sky don't let you choose a game to watch like Amazon do
Here in India, we pay Rs 900 for Hotstar per year for premier league which is roughly 9 british pounds per year and the thing is it shows all the matches in one place, even those that are not televised in England...
Kind of annoyed here in Canada, DAZN had both EPL and CL/EL (and some Serie A) but then they lost the rights for EPL, now I need two streaming services to watch both and doubling the cost.
Illegal streams are terrible though so I just now don't bother with CL/EL as I'm at work when they're on anyway
Something Iâd imagine they gain of those 7 million illegal streamers is fans, fans who buy jerseys, merch, etc. you know spreading the brand. Sure they lose the revenue from them not having a monthly or annual sub. I know they cant just not do nothing, setting a precedence and all, but thatâs a lot of people watching your games there must be a lot of positives to it.
I'm French. I've been streaming illegally games since 2008 and since 2020, I have IPTV. With the latter, for only 50⏠per year, I get to watch thousands of channels across the world, including sports channels. If I wanted to legally watch every games of my favourite team, I'd have to pay about 90⏠for three different services. Besides, I don't watch games every weekend. I remember this season, there was a problem with a UCL broadcaster and fans couldn't watch a part of the game. They pay about 40⏠per month, it was a scandal in France.
Nowadays, illegal streaming's quality has risen and I can watch games in HD. As for the ads, Ublock will block these ads.
One last thing : if they manage to stop piracy all together around the world, I won't pay for these channels and I will only watch games available on free channels. It is the same for many pirates. Ask them this question and I don't think even 30% will accept.
I broke my knee last year, and with my inability to walk I had to sacrifice half a season of watching my club, of which Iâve had a season ticket for 17 years.
Not being able to go to the games hurt more because I missed out on the once certain thing of spending time with my family for a few hours every two weeks.
I love my club and due to not being able to go I just streamed everything that was played (some legally, 3pm games, illegally) and it at least gave me some sense of being a part of it while I was recovering.
We heard today that several people have been jailed for a total of 30 years for creating and distributing a service that provides this; when the real crime is the ridiculous prices that big companies like Sky have been raising for years, in conjunction with the lacklustre service they provide (depending on who you supportâŠ)
A young person like me simply canât afford it, and definitely not while youâre off work, sick like I was.
It shouldnât be a crime to want to watch your football club, and itâs about time the justice system and those at Sky and BT realise that.
Some of these studies assume that if you wouldn't/couldn't pirate the game, you would pay for it and therefore some companies lost revenue. That's definitely not the case as a large part of that pirate 1. Because they can't afford a subscription and/or 2. Don't care enough to pay for a subscription but pirate it because they can.
Accessibility. The music industry discovered it in the '00s
Illegal streams are not only free and poor quality there are also paid ones providing direct TV coverage from US, Australia or NZ. No quality issues and all games for few ÂŁ a month. The UK system of blackouts and three expensive providers makes illegal options appealing. The cases you mentioned of people being prosecuted were those providing illegal streaming services on a commercial nature, not the end user using the service. The UK needs a premflix.
It's not hard to find a high-quality free stream ! :)
@@genjishimada6303 any recommendations?
â@@Manchesto sports tek
I'll tell you why. I'm a Benfica supporter. In Portugal, in order to watch every Benfica game, monthly, you have to pay ⏠42.97: that is âŹ11.99 for Eleven Sports which owns the rights to broadcast the Champions League; ⏠19.99 for Sport TV which owns the rights to broadcast Cup, League Cup and Away League Matches; and ⏠10.99 for BTV (Benfica TV) which owns the rights to broadcast the Home League Matches.
O Benfica Ă© o nosso amorâ€ïž
Before going against illegal streaming they should do something against monopolies of the broadcasters.
For example in germany a tv broadcaster doubled the price because there is no competitor for the matches they stream
As a new Football fan from Canada, Illegal streaming helps drawn in my interest for European football club matches like PSG. Without that, I might not be able to sustain that interest too long as there is no channel to watch European clubs live without paying a hefty sum.
Premier League broadcasting feels like a unique example of competition actually hurting consumers. While it means thereâs no dominant provider ramping up prices at will, it means games are so split up between cable packages, Amazon, Peacock, and probably more I donât even realize because itâs just so much easier to find an illegal stream. Itâs not like I donât want to pay to watch my team, I just wish it were as easy as illegal streaming makes it. You ask to see Liverpool, they show you the Liverpool game. To do it âethicallyâ means to check Amazon prime, check cable, maybe check peacock, and if youâre in England, maybe still never find the game because it literally isnât allowed to air. So dumb. Such a perfect product being squandered by disorganized broadcasting.
thats not competition thats everyone trying to get a piece of the pie, if it was competition it would be offering every game on a single service.
This isn't competition, it's a sanctioned monopoly (only one provider showing a particular game), and it's by no means unique in the UK. Trains and water are other examples of trying to force 'competition' into spaces that don't need it, and where it's been detrimental to the consumer.
@@TheBoySpicer yes exactly
@@TheBoySpicer I think real competition would help here.
Divide up the rights by every match of the season. Allow any channel to buy up the match rights and show it and any app to stream it. The BBC could bid and show for free too to their license payers.
The choice of where to watch it will go up considerably. Fans could pick and choose what they want to pay for.
The problem here is the sanctioned monopoly. It's digital feudalism, not competitive capitalism.
Easy answer: to watch all the games you want (The league, Domestic cups and European games) it costs easily ÂŁ80+ in England, the stupidest part is there is multiple games you cannot watch no matter how much you pay like the 3pm games. The thing that annoys me most it that one of their main reasons for pushing the European Super League is because apparently younger fans arenât watching football anymore, if they made all the games available for decent fee everyone would get it. More youngsters would be able to watch football, more people will be able to afford it which the price it currently is not a lot can and it would stop the need for illegal streaming. The people that own and run these companies are far too greedy and out of touch with the people their product is targeted at that theyâll never do this.
I find it so ironic that during a cost of living crisis, with police going to peoples houses in a crackdown on illegal streaming, BT Sport decides to raise the price of the monthly pass and make it even more unafforable for some people
âWhy do people like winning the lottery?â
thereâs little incentive to watch legitimately when the alternative is so convenient, thereâs no bundle where you can watch prominent leagues at an affordable price, with the leagues being scattered on different platforms (at least here in the US).
Hey Tifo I love your content and how clear your explanations are! Been following for years now!
This is why I'm asking if it's possible for you guys to make a video about the logistics of Matchday for Home and/or away Premier League teams. Traveling, Itinerary, Kit men work, and everything a Club needs to do in order for a matchday to run smoothly. Before and after games and all that. Hope it can be possible!
Thanks you
You want videos about logistics then I'd suggest asking Wendover to cover it
Itâs the same here in Canada where one streaming platform has the rights to a certain league broadcast. So In turn you need atleast 2 subscriptions one for your favourite league and one for the UCL/UEL and both are upto $30 a month
It's so weird that in Africa, if you pay $25 for the basic cable package, you get every single Premier league, Fa Cup, league cup, Champions league, Europa league, La Liga, Serie A game and most eredivisie an championship matches too.
(Not even counting all the African football and international tournaments)
But Britain don't even get 3 o'clock kickoff Premier league games.
fr we are so lucky
Where in Africa? Cant be like that in every country
@@sofus47 it is like that in nigeria
@@sofus47 46 out of 53 sovereign African states have access to DSTV.
I even have a nephew in Swansea who watches football at his University dorm using his parents account, the DSTV app on his phone and a VPN.
In India we pay close to $7 for everything on tv sports, news, movies, tv shows, cartoons, lifestyle channels, religious channels
I live in sudan, as a student its literally impossible for me to justify paying a subscription that in America or europe might be reasonable but here its insanely expensive, add to that the fact that most streaming services dont even work here, if there was a reasonably priced attainable service no doubt ill pay it but i wont pay as much for football as i pay for rent
Here in Argentina the common way of watching football is through cable TV. For the basic suscription, you get a few PL, La Liga, Ligue One and Serie A matches. You also get a few (usually the important-but-not-top) CL and EL matches.
If you want everything else (and to watch the local matches, which are BY FAR the most popular ones here) you have to pay an extra suscription on top of your cable TV suscription. And it's not cheap.
Worst of all, Disney has a monopoly of club football broadcasting here. That suscription and the sports part of the cable TV fee? All to Disney. And I think they don't need me paying them twice to stay in business.
Edit: Oh, and I forgot some matches are broadcasted exclusively through Direct TV (Real Madrid vs Barcelona is the most notorious case). So if you want to watch EVERYTHING, you have to suscribe to them specifically.
Last year, I had a DAZN subscription. I could watch PL, Champions league games, MLS games, all in one place. I didnât mind paying for that, even if it close to $200/year.
This year, DAZN either sold or lost the rights to PL, in Canada. So I had to fork over another $200 for Fubo, just to watch PL.
I also had to buy TSN just to watch the World Cup and the MLS playoffs.
See where Iâm going with this? Streaming rights are sold to the highest bidder, who then turn around and charges ridiculous fees to their customers.
I think itâs less to do with illegal streaming being free and more to do with the legal alternative is so expensive. If all top-level football were a âŹ150 per month subscription service (maybe âŹ60 a year more than a good âdodgy boxâ), illegal streaming would barely be a requirement.
For me itâs pretty simple. I donât watch a lot of football so a subscription isnât worth it for me. But when I want to watch a game itâs easy to just load a stream. You donât have to worry about wich provider shows ist etc etc
I think the underlying issue is that they don't get all leagues or matches that people want on the same reasonably priced subscription. If there was one, I'd expect people to use that instead of constantly fretting about the illegal stream cutting out.
First Scenario: Not all premier league matches are broadcast on the same streaming service.
Another scenario: If you want to get a sports channel subscription, you have to pay for all the useless channels that you'll never watch and pay an extra sports broadcasting fee.
In Kenya, to watch all Premier League matches you have to buy a cable TV package subscription that costs 90 pounds per month. That's 900 pounds per season. Its more expensive here than in the UK đŹđ§.
Remember when we used to watch football for free on tv lmao Crazy
Tifo always with the interesting videos!
In Britain,prem's home country, having to pay 3 different companies,extortioning amounts of money,and not even been able to watch all of your teams games in the league,due to stupid "laws", not even talking about the cups,seems still ludicrous to me. Fist time I became aware of it I couldn't believe it! How can they complain about "piracy",if they want to find scum stealing people's money, they don't have to search for "bandits" and "pirates",all they have to do is turn on the tv on the of the broadcasting "jentlemen" to find the real criminals...
Football subscription companies are too expensive all around the world. Football should be more accessible to everyone ,it used to be the people's sport after all,but how the people in England are tolerating all this mockery they are put through is beyond me...
Well said.
the answer is very simple, there are far too many streaming services for football in the UK and not all games are shown as a result of that, you've also got the cost of signing up to all the streaming services which just makes it unsustainable for most to pay for all.
The main reason I was streaming was the web of multiple platforms that held exclusive rights to a variety of games across the world I was interested in. If I wanted to watch everything I found I'd have to pay for at least two continuing subscriptions and then another three every now and again. Honestly I don't bother watching games much at all at this point.
It's like what happened with music piracy. Watching football is hard due to multiple broadcasters and high cost. People will find a way to watch even though in Arabic. Football needs to do something like what Spotify did and make it more viable, like limiting quality of free stream, few annoying ads here and there, even delay live feed by some time but make it free and you'll see immediate rise in viewership
There are so many leagues and there are sometimes no legal way to watch matches in the US. Even if the rights are held by someone, they don't use them or show them except for big games.
In Norway the price for PL, FA Cup and EL is 79ÂŁ per month an additional 35ÂŁ for champions league and La Liga from another provider
One more thing to add, sometimes even when you get a subscription, you only get commentary in the local languages and no way to have commentary in english, which is the case in Germany and Switzerland.
TRUE