GolfTV shutting down?

[RMGC_NV]

I received an email from GolfTV saying they are shutting down their service December 12th, 2022? For those in the US, this was PGA Tour Live for those living outside of the US.

 

 

Originally this was supposed to be a 12-year, $2 billion distribution deal between Discovery and the PGA Tour... wonder how this all went pear shaped?

 

 

Edited November 11, 2022 by RMGC_NV

[c7015]

WTF !!! 

 

I am outraged 

 

just got this 

[the bishop]

Sucks for you guys - really.

[dropkicked]

I'm in Canada and got the same email..   no biggie since I stopped watching much of any golf (or sports in general) after we got out of lockdown. 😅

[nickp91]

 Golftv was amateur hour from the beginning

[Greg_B]

18 minutes ago, nickp91 said:

 Golftv was amateur hour from the beginning

It was a Discovery operation, so no surprise there.

[Justsomeguy]

PGA tour live has been unbelievably hit or miss since the beginning too, and ever since the ESPN mashup, it isn't much better than standard TV coverage.

It blows me away that there isn't a true subscription service that gets you daily coverage of every tournament.

I know the weekend coverage and majors get taken by the major networks and I can live with that because at least they put it on TV.

But considering how devoted golfers and golf fans are, and our general willingness to overpay for basically anything golf related, how can it not be profitable to figure out some way to cover an entire tournament?

[bladehunter]

Never heard of them. 

[grm24]

Take a deep breath. It appears for those outside of the USA streaming coverage of the PGA Tour will still be available via Discovery+.

 

https://golf.com/news/pga-tour-golftv-end/

 

According to a PGA Tour spokesman, the Tour’s 12-year, $2 billion broadcast agreement with the streaming giant is unaffected by the decision. The Tour’s broadcast rights, the spokesman said, would be transitioned into a larger streaming platform offered by Discovery. The agreement’s financials will remain unchanged.

 

The good news for international golf fans is that the PGA Tour’s streaming rights won’t be any harder to find under the new structure. For many customers, PGA Tour coverage will now be shown on Discovery+. In countries in which Discovery+ is not available, Discovery will offer its PGA Tour programming as part of a different local platform.

 

 

 

Guess this means Henni Koyack will still do her q&a interviews with Tiger. 😃

[Titleist99]

12 years $2billion streaming deal..... Wonder who brokered that deal? He should get a raise!

 

Tiger Woods had a media deal with GolfTV .......Hope that deal stays in tack as well....

[vtpachyderm]

Here in Norway they sent the same message, which said all golf content was moving to their Discovery+ platform. Since the premier league is shutting down for the next month or so, might just give it a shot again (and see what Discovery+ has to offer).
 

[Ferguson]

On 11/12/2022 at 3:02 PM, bladehunter said:

Never heard of them. 

 

Same here.  Must be some kind of "trendy experience" that calls itself TV.

 

 

  

[bladehunter]

1 minute ago, Ferguson said:

 

Same here.  Must be some kind of "trendy experience" that calls itself TV.

 

 

  

Wonder if it came with a free bowl of soup?  Or maybe at least a hat ?  
 

Pga tour live I’ve heard of. But this one escaped me. Must have been what they went to after they left MySpace streaming ?  
 

[Ferguson]

Just now, bladehunter said:

Wonder if it came with a free bowl of soup?  Or maybe at least a hat ?  
 

Pga tour live I’ve heard of. But this one escaped me. Must have been what they went to after they left MySpace streaming ?  
 

 

It was sent by the "team" at GOLFTV so we know there is more than one guy running this thing.  

 

 

 

 

 

"Just send the damned letter out." 

 

 

 

 

[Marty86]

But discovery + is dead in the water essentially as they are merging it with HBO Max by summer 2023. What does that mean until then? Can only watch thursday and friday coverage on discovery + or will they move that coverage to USA network like they did for soccer?

[grm24]

Another good article on GolfTV and it's short run. 

 

https://golf.com/news/inside-golftv-end-pga-tour-broadcast-hot-mic/

Edited November 16, 2022 by grm24

[Greg_B]

11 hours ago, grm24 said:

Another good article on GolfTV and it's short run. 

 

https://golf.com/news/inside-golftv-end-pga-tour-broadcast-hot-mic/

 

I've read that article. I would not call it "good". I still have no idea what it is trying to tell me. It is as if the reporter made a few phone calls, took notes verbatim, and copy/pasted them and called it done. There is nothing which explains very much of anything. It is a very poorly constructed story.

[c7015]

Really comes down to this,

 

Plans had changed, Discovery told the Tour, and so-called “vertical subscription services” were no longer a part of the company’s long-term vision. After a thorough internal review, Discovery found it was cheaper and more cohesive to pursue a “horizontal” model, in which subscribers pay a larger monthly fee for a host of offerings rather than a smaller fee for only one. Soon, the majority of the streaming industry would follow Discovery’s lead in shifting towards a “horizontal” model — an effort that has since been dubbed “The Great Rebundling” — but at the time, the streaming giant was one of the first to begin the shift. GOLFTV and its $9.99/month fee were one of the options principally affected by the change.

 

crappy thing is this is why we all cut cable to "stream"  and now we are back to square one with sports being the anchor and the only thing keeping people locked to "packages". 

 

 

[Ole3wiggle]

14 hours ago, c7015 said:

Really comes down to this,

 

Plans had changed, Discovery told the Tour, and so-called “vertical subscription services” were no longer a part of the company’s long-term vision. After a thorough internal review, Discovery found it was cheaper and more cohesive to pursue a “horizontal” model, in which subscribers pay a larger monthly fee for a host of offerings rather than a smaller fee for only one. Soon, the majority of the streaming industry would follow Discovery’s lead in shifting towards a “horizontal” model — an effort that has since been dubbed “The Great Rebundling” — but at the time, the streaming giant was one of the first to begin the shift. GOLFTV and its $9.99/month fee were one of the options principally affected by the change.

 

crappy thing is this is why we all cut cable to "stream"  and now we are back to square one with sports being the anchor and the only thing keeping people locked to "packages". 

 

 

We've come full circle. You'll soon have companys that just bundle all the streaming services (Hulu, Netflix, Disney+, etc) and sell it to you for 1 monthly fee 😂

[capking]

Got the same email and realized I bought it to watch more of the players championship and have legitimately not opened the app since. 

[c7015]

On 11/17/2022 at 9:45 AM, Ole3wiggle said:

We've come full circle. You'll soon have companys that just bundle all the streaming services (Hulu, Netflix, Disney+, etc) and sell it to you for 1 monthly fee 😂

 

Let's call it "Cable TV...+"

 

and all the tv execs in the room thought it was brilliant 

[Binson]

Should just be on YouTube nowadays.

[Ferguson]

This has been one of the slowest shutdowns I've seen, ever.  

[grm24]

Update:

 

https://golf.com/news/pga-tour-taking-media-rights-distribution-in-house/

 

International golf fans who relied on GolfTV to bring them PGA Tour action in recent years were given cause for concern when the brand was folded by Warner Bros. Discovery in late 2022. What would it mean for their PGA Tour consumption? 

 

In short, the answer is … nothing. At least not for consumers. For WBD and various media partners, it means something slightly different.

 

The Tour has informed those media partners of a rejiggered agreement with WBD this week, which will maintain international Tour rights remain with WBD in most European markets and some in Latin America. Other markets like, for example, Asia, will see PGA Tour rights managed exclusively by the PGA Tour itself, eliminating any third parties to future agreements.

 

Moving forward, the Tour will take back the management of some of its international rights, which always included WBD as one of those third parties. But again, for major European and Latin American markets, that means zero change at all. PGA Tour action will exist like it has for months (if not years) on Eurosport and Discovery+, a streaming platform that many international consumers already use to watch pro golf. 

 

The merger of WarnerMedia and Discovery already paid dividends for some international viewers last month, where The Match VII — always broadcasted by WarnerMedia via TNT — was streamed via EuroSport and Discovery+ in December. Woods played alongside Rory McIlroy, losing to Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas. Discovery+, by comparison, is as little as half the price of GolfTV ($4.99/month with ads; $6.99 without).

Edited January 3, 2023 by grm24

[Marty86]

Golftv is still running on my Fios subscription as if nothing changed. Not sure if something changed or was that europe only.

[gimmeTML]

Can someone explain to my dumb a**...For us Canadians what do we do to stream extended coverage now without GOLFTV?

[CURO]

 

GolfTV is dead.  Looks like TSN is now the rights holder in Canada and I'm sure they have no plans to launch something.  What an absolute embarrassment it is that we cant even PAY FOR A SERVICE.  And they say they want to grow the game.  

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/adam_stanley/status/1611399697209376768?s=20&t=qyctobKOJc2CGx4gG2cCww

[capking]

3 hours ago, CURO said:

 

GolfTV is dead.  Looks like TSN is now the rights holder in Canada and I'm sure they have no plans to launch something.  What an absolute embarrassment it is that we cant even PAY FOR A SERVICE.  And they say they want to grow the game.  

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/adam_stanley/status/1611399697209376768?s=20&t=qyctobKOJc2CGx4gG2cCww

That’s unfortunate, TSN will likely Play 5 channels of ESPN sports talk before they show golf on a weekday. Their app is also pretty glitchy

[golfortennis]

On 1/6/2023 at 5:11 PM, CURO said:

 

GolfTV is dead.  Looks like TSN is now the rights holder in Canada and I'm sure they have no plans to launch something.  What an absolute embarrassment it is that we cant even PAY FOR A SERVICE.  And they say they want to grow the game.  

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/adam_stanley/status/1611399697209376768?s=20&t=qyctobKOJc2CGx4gG2cCww

 

That's the Canadian way:  pay for rights to not show something, just so someone else can't show it.  I don't think it is quite as bad as it was in the 90s, but the networks were notorious for buying the rights to US shows, and then not airing them, just so another network couldn't air them and make money off them.  In most cases though the joke was on them because you could just watch on the US network.

 

Once again, Michael Crichton's "TV people are the stupidest people" rings true. 

[capking]

43 minutes ago, golfortennis said:

 

That's the Canadian way:  pay for rights to not show something, just so someone else can't show it.  I don't think it is quite as bad as it was in the 90s, but the networks were notorious for buying the rights to US shows, and then not airing them, just so another network couldn't air them and make money off them.  In most cases though the joke was on them because you could just watch on the US network.

 

Once again, Michael Crichton's "TV people are the stupidest people" rings true. 

TSN has sucked since they stopped showing national NHL games, probably karma for stealing the Hockey Night theme song.