5-9-13
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that ESPN is considering a plan to pay wireless carriers for the mobile content used by subscribers. When users reach their data limit, they log off to avoid overage charges. That also means they will no longer see mobile ads being served up by companies like ESPN. The Journal says ESPN is discussing, with at least one carrier, subsidizing connectivity on behalf of users.
The company would pay a carrier to guarantee that people viewing ESPN mobile content wouldn't have that usage counted toward their monthly data caps. According to the Journal report, ESPN has received feedback from at least one big carrier that significant numbers of its mobile users reach their monthly cap before the end of the month, after which their usage drops off.
The ESPN digital brand is huge. According to the Journal, ESPN now has 45 million digital users, including about 16 million that access ESPN content exclusively from mobile devices. The mobile offerings include a website with news and streaming video, and a host of mobile apps, including WatchESPN which streams the live signals from ESPN's TV channels over the Web. ScoreCenter, its top mobile app, has been downloaded more than 40 million times. Over the last three years, ESPN's average users per day on mobile Web and apps has more than tripled, from 3.2 million in 2010 to more than 10.3 million so far this year.
Read the full Wall Street Journal HERE (Subscription required)
