The National Football League will be blocking video streaming of Super Bowl XLVIII at MetLife stadium in order to control the use of bandwidth. Over 80,000 football fans will descend on MetLife this Sunday to watch the big game, which will put a huge burden on cellular networks since fans will undoubtedly be using Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, and other apps to keep in touch with friends.
While the four major carriers have invested heavily in creating a more robust network around MetLife, the NFL doesn’t want to take a risk to allow unrestricted bandwidth use during Super Bowl XLVIII. “While we could have made some available, it might have impacted the ability for the majority of fans to be able to stay connected to social media, tweet, Facebook, that kind of thing,” says NFL Chief Information Officer Michelle McKenna-Doyle. By blocking video streaming at MetLife, the NFL is ensuring network congestion won’t affect people attending the game and those within proximity to the stadium as well.
McKenna-Doyle remains optimistic that technology will grow to the point where the NFL won’t have to limit bandwidth usage at all. Currently, live streams use unicast technology which streams IP packets to individual users instead of sending those packets to a group of hosts. Sending packets to a group of hosts is called “multicast,” a technology that sadly won’t be implemented in time for this year’s Super Bowl.
However, the NFL has released an official Super Bowl XLVIII app for Android and iOS to provide a “second screen” experience for those lucky enough to attend the game. Fans will be able to access an event guide with “exclusive content” like play bios, stats, and more but the apps will not allow any video streaming. You can download the apps below.
Download the Super Bowl XLVIII – Official Program: Android | iOS
Source: Ars Technica
