[edshakey]

Pretty incredible that not only is the live stream now paywalled, but the "highlights" video below is unbelievably poor!

I left a comment on the video (I'm ES) about the same thing which, judging by the number of votes, is a popular opinion. Hopefully the IFSC at least notice the unhappy comments - it was a truly awful summary of something we're unable to watch in any other way.

[Stabbsy]

I might be a bit biased as I love cycling but the £40 (actually £20 this year) for a Eurosport subscription is an absolute bargain. Tour of Flanders last week was epic, Tour of Basque today was brilliant, Amstel Gold tomorrow it goes on and on. Between Eurosport and Quest that is all my TV viewing covered. The climbing is just a bonus.

I’m in the same boat - I pay the annual amount basically so I can watch the spring classics. It was pretty much worth it for Tour of Flanders alone this year.

That said, currently watching a replay of the final and never thought I’d hear myself say it, but bring back Matt Groom! The Eurosport commentator is appalling. The best bit of commentary so far on W1 was the commentator saying that the route setter envisaged the climber dropping to their knees on the yellow volume for the last move. I presume they meant using a drop knee, but the uninitiated are going to be very confused!

[Bradders]

I just realised that Eurosport is included with Amazon Prime, albeit I can't find the women's final just the semi 

Matt Groom is commentating the semi at least Stabbsy.

[fatneck]

Good to here Eurosport is included with Prime membership. How do we access this Nick?

Also, turns out my free Discovery+ membership is Entertainment package only 

If anyone can give a heads up on when finals go live on YouTube it would be appreciated

[Bradders]

Sorry, my bad. I must have added Eurosport as a channel to my Prime subscription for the Olympics and then forgot to cancel if  It's £6.99 extra a month 

[Bradders]

If it helps, the bloke who did the Olympic commentary is back again. The drop knee thing Stabbsy mentioned was jaw dropping, pretty sure he has no idea what a drop knee is.

He also said the angle of the first problem was "17' from parallel".... 

The worst bit though is he's not accompanied by the usual athlete co-commentator!

[edshakey]

Fanny Gibert is the first competitor I've seen to post something about the streaming situ. She's got something on her FB (and presumably Instagram) story currently about how it's bad, sharing the words of someone else - Nico Januel?

Could be the start of more athletes speaking out about it?

[Duma]

https://www.instagram.com/p/CcJEf2aNukY/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Assume it's this?
Nico is a French team coach btw.

I don't get the bit about the IFSC giving the athletes the money, assume it's sarcasm?

[edshakey]

I'm not on Instagram, but I believe that's the one.

Yeah I think it must be sarcasm - only way it would make sense?

If he's a coach, then maybe we can expect more from the French team on the matter.

[Duma]

OTOH, Stasa Gejo, probably one of the most active on social media, has just posted that she doesn't see what the fuss is about, which seems pretty short sighted.

[Duma]

Here is the text:

World Cup climbers,

I am very surprised to see the absence of reactions about the streaming. Today was a disaster for you.

Even in football it's difficult to sell subscriptions.

You will become invisible to the climbing world.

In few times you're not going to interest
any sponsors anymore.

You are the losers in this story while you are the main actors.

Our sport is not at all mature enough to
have paid diffusion.

Fortunately, Ifsc will give you back all TV rights money.

Keep fighting guys!!!!

[edshakey]

OTOH, Stasa Gejo, probably one of the most active on social media, has just posted that she doesn't see what the fuss is about, which seems pretty short sighted.

That does seem incredible. Is she at all accommodating of the angry fans' opinions? Implying people should just get over it is not a way to gain any sort of popularity.

[Clart]

Looks like it'll still be free outside of Europe. Sounds like a major flaw on the IFSC's part, much easier to get around this way. I'm still hopefully for a U turn but given how large the deal probably is, it seems a bit unlikely.

Great, should be free in the UK then?

[Duma]

So apparently the comps are available free with 24hr delay on the Olympic channel? Where/what is this? The discovery+ that I got and then cancelled for the Olympics doesn't work on my TV anymore (not supported (the TV is 2016 FFS!))

[Duma]

https://www.instagram.com/p/CcLYrenDo2P/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Alex Waterhouse IG post
Text reads:

A few weeks ago, the IFSC announced that this Discovery had acquired the rights to this year's World Cup livestreams, and the live broadcast would be put behind a paywall in Europe and some other countries. Replays of the streams will be available 24 hours later on YouTube, and spectators in the US will still be able to view the live stream as normal. The IFSC attempted to pull off a similar deal in 2017 with FloSport, but this was reneged after significant pushback from fans and athletes.

Yesterday, I put up a story asking my followers who normally watch comps (a particularly engaged set of fans keen enough to follow someone yet to make a WC final!) how they planned to watch the stream this weekend. Over half of the respondents weren't going to watch at all. Of those willing to make the effort in a paywalled country, over 75% are going tune into the USA steam via a VPN and only a fraction are going to subscribe to Discovery/Eurosport. This is far from a comprehensive study, but the numbers point to a very worrying trend that could threaten the future of the sport. Extrapolated, this equates to tens or hundreds of thousands of people less watching the comp live. Climbing's viewership is growing fast, and adding in extra hurdles is going to limit that massively. Core fans will probably still watch, but it'll be hard to convince someone on the fence to take the plunge and purchase a subscription.

Most comp climbers in the UK at least are self funded. I am really lucky to work with sponsors as that is the only way to support my international career, and I want to be able to support them in return as much as possible. I am struggling to see how this deal supports that. I think we need to start a conversation and hear from the IFSC and Discovery how they plan to grow the sport over the next years until Paris and beyond. Everything has its teething issues, but the direction is worrying and the decisions are happening behind closed doors and with limited athlete input. I believe the IFSC has the best interest of our sport in mind, but I'm worried that this is will be a damaging decision for fans and athletes without significant improvement in the quality of the presentation.
The IFSC, setters, organizers and athletes put on a heck of a show this weekend in Meiringen. One of the best comps to watch in a long time! I just want that, and climbing, to be enjoyed by as many people as possible across the world, and I think conversations like these are an important part of that.

[mattbirddog]

I'm not on Instagram, but I believe that's the one.

Yeah I think it must be sarcasm - only way it would make sense?

If he's a coach, then maybe we can expect more from the French team on the matter.

The reference is to the IFSC press release saying this was going to be great for athletes in terms of commercial revenue.

[Wellsy]

OTOH, Stasa Gejo, probably one of the most active on social media, has just posted that she doesn't see what the fuss is about, which seems pretty short sighted.

It is rather short sighted but Stasa is very cool so I don't really mind. I think also she does have a point; it is cheap and usually to watch sports you do have to pay something

[abarro81]

I guess how it works out will depend on whether it turns out that most comp watchers are
A. Fans who will pay
Or
B. People like me who like having the comp on while they stretch, cook dinner or do an ARC session on their fingerboard... who won't pay and will just watch Netflix or listen to a podcast instead and maybe watch the replay later if it was supposed to be a good comp

[moose]

I get Eurosport with my cable package (I'm an inveterate football and NFL fan so pay silly money for sports channels).  I was heartened to see that the women's finals were broadcast live on the main Eurosport 1 channel but the men's finals are being shown on a 5 hour delay at 10pm, as a second-rate darts tournament and a Turkish cycling race are on while they are live.  Admittedly the Amstel Gold Race partly overlaps but climbing really does look like a filler / "small fish in big pond" in its new context.

[Duma]

So men's final not shown live? That is an absolute piss take, and has certainly swung me to the VPN route if I decide to bother at all.

[Bradders]

Yep, bullshit. Why on earth would anyone pay for a live stream when a) it's not live, b) it's being shown late at night, and c) it'll be available for free shortly thereafter?!

[Duma]

d) has laughably bad commentary compared to the one the yanks get for free

[sirlockoff]

I use zenmate for chrome as VPN, it is free, and manages to deliver 480p without buffering 

[Duma]

Text from IG post by Manu:

manu_cornu

A few days before Meiringen, just like 5 years ago, streaming rights for the competition were sold. Back in 2017 we had all protested with a red card and by boycotting the competition at the start of the semi-final.
We are the actors of the show offered with each competition and I strive to keep our sport accessible to all.
Competition fans behind their screens are not the only ones affected by this change. Event organizers who are looking for partners to offer free streaming for these competitions in order to reach a larger audience are also on the front line.
We, the athletes, need visibility, most of us have image contracts, and this change will inevitably. bring changes to these contracts because of this loss of visibility. This entails potentially losing contracts and impacts our ability to build our careers as athletes.
Athletes, teams, and organizers live and accomplish their goals in large part thanks to the worldwide visibility offered by the live streams.
We are not a sufficiently developed sport today to be able to generate revenues significant enough to subsidize the athletes.
A first step would be for the federation to share parts of its revenues with the athletes.
Today, nothing has been agreed upon, neither with the athletes nor with the federations, but even if it had the scales would be too low.
I do not understand and do not support the decision of our international federation. We need to be united among climbers to respond to this development that simply does not work.
And the federation needs to place its athletes at the heart of its projects.
If there are no climbers, there is nothing to negotiate.

Integrating ads in free streaming would be a more constructive idea...

Things must change, let's unite!

[erm, sam]

I have eurosport on tv as part of the bundle I have and even with that it is super annoying. The non live coverge of the mens was delayed due to the darts, fucking darts, overunning and they have edited it so you don't see everybody climb everythign and the commentator as disscussed is totally excrable. I'm sure he is a very nice man but skilled climbing commentator he is not. In the intro behind his rhetorical bellowing you could hear Matt Groom and another bloke having an interesting conversation about the problems, just to rub it in.