The Death of the Stadium
3D TV era is almost upon us. With this new technology one of the biggest aspects that makers of 3D TVs are banking on is sports programming. They are hoping that the 3D experience becomes so immersive that people actually decide to stay at home instead of going to the stadium. A few factors are looking good in 3D’s favour; firstly the technology has come a long way from things jumping out of the screen at you where now it is almost as if the person is sitting on the field. Secondly there is the cost factor; the price of season tickets is increasing every year, while a 3D TV will be a onetime investment. However will this actually kill the charm of going to the stadium or are there other reasons why people watch games in stadiums?
It seems more people are watching more sports on TV at their homes. Sports ratings are going through the roof and it seems people are enjoying more sports at home; the percentage of Americans who watch sports at home has gone up from 22.6% to 36.1% in one year. There are a few factors which relates to this jump in viewer-ship numbers; better technology, more income and increased love of the game. We can focus on one aspect of this and see how better technology is helping to get more people to watch more sports. HD TVs are already in many people’s living rooms and the picture quality and clarity make for a very enjoyable match viewing. 3D might blow HD out of the water and make it even more fun to watch sports games at TV.
It seems that stadiums are in trouble; the owners have realised that TV quality is getting better and people would rather stay at home and watch a game in their living rooms. Stadiums have astonishingly started to implement the same sort of get up as that of concerts and have started to become unbearably loud with the extra sound weapons fans tend to bring; they have started to place massive screens all around the stadium in order to give people the quality of watching a game on TV but also having the experience of watching it at the stadium. Stadiums still have a big advantage up their sleeves; going to watch a game at a stadium is a very enjoyable experience. Most people go with their friends and families and interact and hang out with other supporters of their team. It is as if all the people in a stadium become like one and they all chant the same chants and cheer for the same plays. That sort of camaraderie and atmosphere cannot be achieved sitting at home unless you can get 80,000 people shoved into your home.
The big disadvantage that stadiums face is the fact that ticket prices are going through the roof at the same rate as footballers and other sports stars salaries are going up. Buying a season ticket these days has slowly gone to levels where it is inaccessible to the common sports fan. The rich fans can still afford them but ordinary people have a difficult time enjoying their favourite sport these days. In comparison 3D technology will be a onetime investment and soon it will be as easy to own a 3D TV as it is to own a net book today. Once prices come down and early technology issues are sorted out and when consumers start buying 3D TVs in large quantities, the stadiums of the world better watch out.
At the moment sporting event organisers have to deal with another troubling issue for them. Free online streaming websites have started to eat into their profits. A lot of people are sitting at their laptops and illegally streaming sports events for free. This is the same issue that the music industry and the movie industry faced in the past. They were unable to deal with it effectively but maybe sports organisers can embrace the problem and come up with innovative solutions that would keep everyone happy at the end of the day. Once they have sorted out this problem they will then have to get back to dealing with the other big threat on the horizon; 3D technology.
We will have to wait and see in what direction this whole scenario develops into. It could be that people adopt 3D technology and still enjoy going to stadiums to watch live games. Or it might swing the other way as well; people might find 3D TVs so immersive and the quality so good that they stay at home to watch the games. This is one for the future and as technology changes so rapidly these days it might be that something new and improved comes along in a few years time that will make 3D technology seem obsolete.
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