Why No Video Streaming of home games

[Maui Boy in Alaska]

This might be information that people already know, but thought I would share. I was frustrated by the lack of video streaming options for a Home game, so I e-mailed UH this this was the response i got from Media Relations and Athletics department. Hope this gets solved soon.

Oceanic Cable was recently sold to Charter Communications and together they have chosen to not distribute OC Sports telecasts via live video streaming. Oceanic owns our television rights that are not picked up by the networks and pays us approximately $2.3 million a year for the rights. Oceanic monetizes their rights by providing a pay-per-view model for the sport of football in the state of Hawaii. Unfortunately, if the game is streamed, Oceanic is unable at this time (they are working on it) to block the signal coming back into Hawaii. Streaming in the state of Hawaii is not supported by their revenue model.If you live in Hawaii, you can see the game by purchasing the pay-per-view. Outside of Hawaii, until Oceanic is able to block the streaming back into Hawaii, our contract and Oceanic’s financial model do not support streaming. Oceanic is continuing to search for solutions that allow for distribution of live telecasts both within and outside of Hawaii. While we understand your frustration, I can assure you we are working with Oceanic to find a solution. Unfortunately tomorrow night's game will not be available online.

[415hawaiiboy]

Although frustrating, glad to know they are working on it. Hopefully the fix comes soon. Mahalo

[415hawaiiboy]

This issue needs to be resolved for all sports

[couz808]

What year is it? So they're saying they do not have the technology to stream it outside and block the signal coming into hawaii? wow!

[415hawaiiboy]

I'm no tech expert but VPN technology is one way to circumvent this and to completely block that may that beyond a year and will need the help of the CIA, NSA and Google. I'm sure this is on the priority list. Until then, let's just say the PPV model just lost a lot more value for UH due to limitations for all visual communications outside the 1.2M population hawaii market.

And we have to wait until 2019 for the contract to end. I have a bad feeling.

[poidog]

i'm guessing the hold-up is Oceanic, as making the games available for online streaming devalues their broadcast rights. they pay for the right to say that OC16/OC12 are the only places where you can watch UH sports. in order to provide streaming they have to come up with a way to provide access only to customers outside of Hawaii, and like 415hawaiiboy says above, the usual methods for doing this are flawed. the way most tv providers distribute their streaming content is by using a cable company login that grants you streaming rights to content you would normally have as part of your cable package. But being that the demand for streaming would come from people who do not have an account with oceanic and/or are already in the local market, this method does not do anything to meet the needs of mainland fans.

The best way thing for the university to do is run its own content network in partnership with Oceanic or HNN or some other parther who doesn't own the content.

[FatJeff]

Oceanic/Charter are showing they know what's up. I watched away games last season with a VPN on the MWC website. I was able to plug an HDMI cable from my laptop to my TV and got the full experience. Won't be able to do that this year. The option besides paying the expensive pay-per-view price is to Google video feeds and chance the malware lurking on so many of the results.

[PCBoy]

Oceanic/Charter are showing they know what's up. I watched away games last season with a VPN on the MWC website. I was able to plug an HDMI cable from my laptop to my TV and got the full experience. Won't be able to do that this year. The option besides paying the expensive pay-per-view price is to Google video feeds and chance the malware lurking on so many of the results.

How many of the people that used a VPN in the past would pay to watch the ppv now? I'm willing to bet, not that many. So to gain a few extra buys, they alienate the whole UH fan base outside of Hawaii.

[415hawaiiboy]

Will this lifelong hawaii fan get to see Dru Brown start his first game against Nevada this Saturday?

[RedZone]

If families on the mainland can not watch their kids it may hurt our recruiting efforts there.

[SundayJam]

The video quality of the MWC sight was lame at best, but I did get to watch a few games. The best option was when Hawaiian Tel streamed the games for $10...or was that $15? I gladly paid that amount to watch rather than rely on hokey websites sponsored by internet gambling sites. I guess I will only get to watch the occasional away game or ESPN broadcast of another beatdown.

[415hawaiiboy]

There is another group also besides Oceanic/Charter, MWC, it is Campus Insiders which I believe is the streaming service that the MWC routes you to watch the games. Just speculation, but Campus Insiders was created to distribute video content far and wide like Youtube. Along comes our special situation with PPV. Might be a reason for technical difficulties that is outside Campus Insiders priorities. Just speculation. Of course Espn 3 had the technology to block the signal, so things were fine when we were in the WAC. Could a possible solution be for UH/MWC/OC to use another streaming service that has those capabilities to block?

[RedZone]

Oceanic/Charter are showing they know what's up. I watched away games last season with a VPN on the MWC website. I was able to plug an HDMI cable from my laptop to my TV and got the full experience. Won't be able to do that this year. The option besides paying the expensive pay-per-view price is to Google video feeds and chance the malware lurking on so many of the results.

How many of the people that used a VPN in the past would pay to watch the ppv now? I'm willing to bet, not that many. So to gain a few extra buys, they alienate the whole UH fan base outside of Hawaii.

It is all about money. Unless they feel that they can make more by streaming I don't see them doing it. If they wanted more subscribers to PPV they should lower prices. If they continue in this path and our team continue in its downward spiral people will just lose interest and find other teams to watch on game day. There are plenty of them and a lot of the games don't cost you anything extra to watch them. UH hands are probably tied to the contract with the cable company. It is apparent that they had nothing in it regarding the streaming of video to the mainland in it otherwise this would not be a problem.

[PCBoy]

The video quality of the MWC sight was lame at best, but I did get to watch a few games. The best option was when Hawaiian Tel streamed the games for $10...or was that $15? I gladly paid that amount to watch rather than rely on hokey websites sponsored by internet gambling sites. I guess I will only get to watch the occasional away game or ESPN broadcast of another beatdown.

The MWC stream was in HD for me when I had to use it. It is like ESPN3 where it is dependent on your internet speed/ping.

[PCBoy]

There is another group also besides Oceanic/Charter, MWC, it is Campus Insiders which I believe is the streaming service that the MWC routes you to watch the games. Just speculation, but Campus Insiders was created to distribute video content far and wide like Youtube. Along comes our special situation with PPV. Might be a reason for technical difficulties that is outside Campus Insiders priorities. Just speculation. Of course Espn 3 had the technology to block the signal, so things were fine when we were in the WAC. Could a possible solution be for UH/MWC/OC to use another streaming service that has those capabilities to block?

The MWC streaming already had a location block for ip adresses coming from Hawaii. However, its not that difficult to get around it. Unless UH starts winning and there is demand on the mainland to see the games in future seasons, I don't see this being resolved soon. But if UH becomes relevant again, CBSN/ESPN would probably pick up more games