NBC and Intel Team-Up To Deliver Broadband Content

[Joseph_Gallant]

NBC and Intel have announced a deal whereas those with computers containing Intel "Viv" technology will be able to receive on-demand content from NBC.

The technology will be first used next month for highlights of NBC's coverage of the Winter Olympics.

I have one question: During the 2004 Summer Olympics, one was able to get highlights from NBC's coverage online through NBC Olympics.com, but one had to leave a Visa credit card number, not for the user to be charged, but to verify that the user lived in the United States. The user wasn't charged for watching the highlights, but if he/she lived outside the Uninted States, the user was unable to watch. I believe some kind of restriction was also put on BBC's Olympic site to prevent those outside of Britain from watching BBC Olympic highlights.

How would this comply with IOC regulations on Internet Olympic coverage?? Or have the regulations changed (i.e. X minutes of highlights from a certain event can be put online by any Olympic broadcast rightsholder once that event has been broadcast in the rightsholder's own country)??

 

[toby]

> The technology will be first used next month for highlights
> of NBC's coverage of the Winter Olympics.

I can give you the highlights of NBC's Olympic coverage right now:
America is wonderful and great, so who the hell cares about these other silly non-American countries and what they did.

It is a shame that instead of a spectacle of sports NBC's coverage is pandering jingoism. What we need is a technology to be able not watch any NBC Olympic coverage, but real Olympic coverage instead.

<P ID="signature">______________
<a href=http://blog.spotteddogs.org/blog/>Random Observations on Life, the Universe and Television</a></P>

 

[Markxxx]

> I have one question: During the 2004 Summer Olympics, one
> was able to get highlights from NBC's coverage online
> through NBC Olympics.com, but one had to leave a Visa credit
> card number, not for the user to be charged, but to verify
> that the user lived in the United States. The user wasn't
> charged for watching the highlights, but if he/she lived
> outside the Uninted States, the user was unable to watch. I
> believe some kind of restriction was also put on BBC's
> Olympic site to prevent those outside of Britain from
> watching BBC Olympic highlights.
>
Where I work our merchant agreement with Visa and MC specifically forbid requiring the use of Visa or MasterCard for Identification purposes. In fact both agreements forbit us to use Visa or MC for anything but presentation for a charge<P ID="signature">______________
Once I figured out the meaning of life....Then I forgot to write it down.</P>

 

[jegrant]

> Where I work our merchant agreement with Visa and MC
> specifically forbid requiring the use of Visa or MasterCard
> for Identification purposes. In fact both agreements forbit
> us to use Visa or MC for anything but presentation for a
> charge

AFAIK, the Visa card was used not as a method of identifying the cardholder personally.

From what I read, it was used to ensure the person sitting at the computer wanting to watch Olympics had a *Visa* card - period. As Visa was an official sponsor, and this was considered a "benefit" for the "club" of Visa customers.
(I suppose there may also have been a check to make sure it was a US card.)

Had it truly been for identification, then probably any credit card would have been fine, and NBC could have charged a token fee of 99 cents or so for an "NBC Olympic Streaming Passport" to satisfy the aforementioned contractual requirements.