Facebook's loss is Twitter's gain?
After Facebook backed out of negotiations to land the rights to stream NFL games, its fellow social media powerhouse, Twitter, has swooped right in to secure the rights to digitally stream 10 Thursday Night Football games worldwide during the 2016 NFL season.
The way it will work is Twitter will stream the 10 Thursday Night Football games broadcast by NBC and CBS, which will also be simulcast on the NFL Network, reaching the social media outlet's 800 million registered and non-registered users globally.
The Twitter-NFL partnership will also include in-game highlights in addition to pre-game Periscope broadcasts from teams and players, giving fans a more encompassing experience.
"Twitter is where live events unfold and is the right partner for the NFL as we take the latest step in serving fans around the world live NFL football," NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said in a press release from the league Tuesday. "There is a massive amount of NFL-related conversation happening on Twitter during our games and tapping into that audience, in addition to our viewers on broadcast and cable, will ensure Thursday Night Football is seen on an unprecedented number of platforms this season. This agreement also provides additional reach for those brands advertising with our broadcast partners."
Twitter is equally excited about the partnership.
"This is about transforming the fan experience with football. People watch NFL games with Twitter today," Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said as part of the league's announcement. "Now they'll be able to watch right on Twitter Thursday nights."
Their partnership comes after Yahoo's global digital stream of last season's Buffalo Bills-Jacksonville Jaguars game on October 25 received 33.6 million video streams with 480 million streamed minutes - 33 percent of which being international audiences across 185 countries outside of the United States.
The audience for football is insatiable and those numbers that Yahoo recorded more than proved just that. The fact that Twitter users will be able to watch the game on the same outlet that they can tweet and comment about it is bound to take fans' viewing experience to an entirely new level.
We'd call that a Twitter touchdown!
