Online access to the NCAA men’s basketball championship tournament will...
Online access to the NCAA men’s basketball championship tournament will be limited to authenticated subscribers of Turner’s pay-TV networks for many games this year, Turner Sports and CBS Sports said. In previous years, all games were available free online. Games…
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that air on CBS’s broadcast network will be available free on CBSSports.com. But games on Turner’s TBS, TNT and truTV networks will be available only to authenticated subscribers, they said. “Authenticating this year’s tournament across the Turner Networks is an extension of the company’s TV Everywhere initiative,” the company said. Additionally, access to all the games on multiple platforms including Android and iOS devices can be had for a $4 purchase, they said . “While this is a step in the right direction, we still do not like that CBS is streaming their games for free,” said BTIG analyst Richard Greenfield. “We believe they should have followed an authentication model like Turner as they are trying to drive retrans,” he said. The companies should also charge more for access to the games on multiple platforms, he said. “Turner/CBS should want to enhance the value perception of a multichannel video subscription in consumers’ minds and at the same time put extreme pressure on MVPDs … who are not yet authenticating,” he said.