Team Handball

EHF Champion’s League Highlights Video

A decent video recapping some of the highlights from the Champion’s League Group Stage is available at this link.

http://www.dr.dk/Sporten/Haandbold/Liga_maend/2005/11/16/Champions+League+Magazine.htm

I read in a newspaper article recently that thousands of people are now regularly downloading Desperate Housewives and other shows. AOL has free downloads of many vintage television shows like Maverick and Welcome Back Kotter. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to ask the question, “Gee, if they can do that for crummy reruns, why is just a Handball highlight show available, why not an entire match in HDTV format?” Believe it or not, this blog regularly gets a hit from internet searches with the terms “download” "video" and “handball” in them. Well at least now they won't be disappointed as this is the best available video that I know of.

The good news is that it is only a matter of time before even more will be available. The big question is whether the major Team Handball entities (IHF, EHF) have the marketing sense to be early adopters of this technology. If they can make good content readily available it could be a marketing bonanza. They need, however, to view downloaded content as not just another revenue stream. They need to see it instead as an opportunity to grow the sport world-wide. Charging for content now = a few dollars. Charging for content later (after more people are hooked) = big dollars.

posted by John Ryan @ 9:50 PM