It’s The Scum, but could this affect ticket sales and thus our budget? 
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Having watched a few games on ifollow I doubt if full screening on Saturday afternoons would make much difference to gates for most matches at our level. There is nothing like being at a game with several thousand others and if we were successful, playing good attractive football ( I am dreaming again) it could actually bring in fans . I suppose the other factor is the price of the package or individual game.
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They’ll need to stamp out the piracy first. Can watch every iFollow game (all clubs, all divisions) with varying levels of quality on a cracked Firestick for around £40 a year.
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Stephan Gamble made reference to Article 48 on Monday evening when asked about the possibility of away games being shown live at the Stadium Suite or Saddlers Club as a way of generating revenue.
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It could be open to being shown in pubs though.
There have been several times this season we’ve jokingly said “Maybe we should stay down at the pub, instead of going to the match”.
If the option to stay down the pub AND watch the game is there, quite a few may decide on that especially if we’re in a bad run or the weathers shit.
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As I haven’t renewed I’d be very tempted to watch the games from my warm home with a. Beer in a Glass and I can either play Pokemon at the same time or turn it off if bored.
Great idea!
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As I’m not renewing my ST I’m getting my girlfriends brother to sort the firestick so I can watch the matches.
Will still go to some but will watch most on that, especially in the winter.
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Been here before haven’t we. Remember ITV ďigital. Lets hope hope clubs only spend the money once they’ve got it in their accounts this time. Unfortunately there will always be some that don’t and so will make it more diificult for those clubs that practice responsible financial management.
Its about time it was ended its 50 years old times have changed hugely and streaming is part of everyday life for most now
I’ve got a fire stick but still buy the ST for ifollow. That way I feel I’m putting my money in, even though I am not there.
I do think it will affect attendances though, it already does midweek, based on the posts on here.
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Always backed the 3pm blackout but the argument for it is becoming thinner these days to be honest.
I’m not sure how much difference it makes in this day and age for a club our size.
Ifollow model is shit basically and a proper tv deal is the only way for this to happen. Fighting a losing battle might as well get on with it. It’s gonna happen sooner or later.
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The reason ITV Digital collapsed is that no one was paying for it. I knew so many people that had a “dodgy box” and just watched it for free.
As Simon mentioned above it will be even more of a problem now when you can get a firestick with everything on for next to nothing.
I am in favour of the 3 pm blackout personally. Football was never meant to be a TV programme but at the same time, it is inevitable football will go further down this route sooner rather than later.
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The old gold cards for ITV digital lol.
Less of that on here! 
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It’s not the Firestick that gives you access per se, but some dodgy app or other that you can sideload onto it in order to access a hooky stream that someone has diverted from behind a paywall into the murky depths of the interweb.
Various authorities (usually the content owner themselves, but sometimes a national or regulatory agency) try to stamp these streams out, but it gets to be a global version of whack-a-mole. They might get the odd organised cabal but there is always an endless supply of lone spotty teenagers in darkened bedrooms willing to do it just because they can. And for every keyboard warrior supplying a free stream, there are hundreds if not thousands of eager viewers ready to link to it to avoid paying (and hiding behind VPNs while they’re doing it) - it’s almost impossible to track them all down.
There will still be a lot of people willing to pay for services (or else all the providers being hijacked would have already given up) but it depends on what DAZN or whoever want to charge as to what the take-up would be. Do you pay a single fee for access to all available matches? Only for you own team’s games? Pay-per-view? Same for L2 as Championship? Or only get as part of a more expensive wider package from DAZN (or Sky, BT, Virgin, etc)? Or, the holy grail for most fans, free to air via an aerial and they make their money from advertising and sponsorship?
And do clubs get a set percentage of any pot or will it be based on viewing figures (like iFollow is)?
The model they go for could make or break many clubs, and/or deny all but the affluent or non-law abiding from watching at home.
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Problem with an influx of money to all clubs is that agents know clubs have an extra £x hundred thousand, or £x million and up wage demands.
Some clubs will then of course pay as their ownership is less than sensible and/or they want to stay on the gravy train, and this means that even those that won’t eventually will have to pay out more on wages as the average wage goes up, eventually bringing everyone back to where they were, but at an inflated level.
This is why Premier League footballers now earn £500k a week, when £50k a week was top whack 25 years ago.
I think ITV Digital overestimated the appeal of some of the games they offered. Coverage of a first round League Cup tie between Cambridge United and the Baggies attracted so few paying viewers, it would have been cheaper to pay for taxis to take them to Cambridge rather than broadcast it.
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