"March madness" starts today!
The NCAA men's basketball tournament starts today (March 15th) with Ohio State and North Carolina defending their Number One seeds, and Number Two Georgetown and UCLA looking for victories as well. The first-round action continues tomorrow (March 16th) with Kansas and returning champ Florida protecting their Number One status and teams from all over the country trying for upsets and a chance to move on to the next round.
The tournament affectionately known as March Madness is broadcast on CBS, which also streams games on their website for free. The streaming hasn't always been free, but, as CBS Sports and News President Sean McManus told us, fans weren't willing to pay for the service: "You are not going to get people to pay for something they're used to getting for free. We did it on a pay-per-view basis, on a subscription, and it wasn't that expensive, I think it was $20, I think we had less than 25,000 people sign up. When we did it for free we had millions of people watching. It was the single biggest live Internet event, I think, in history."
McManus jokingly added that CBS employees won't get in trouble for watching games online while at work: "At CBS Sports, and probably CBS, anybody that wants to watch the tournament on their computer, we give them special dispensation to do that. We dock them some of their pay, but we make it up in overtime."
The tournament affectionately known as March Madness is broadcast on CBS, which also streams games on their website for free. The streaming hasn't always been free, but, as CBS Sports and News President Sean McManus told us, fans weren't willing to pay for the service: "You are not going to get people to pay for something they're used to getting for free. We did it on a pay-per-view basis, on a subscription, and it wasn't that expensive, I think it was $20, I think we had less than 25,000 people sign up. When we did it for free we had millions of people watching. It was the single biggest live Internet event, I think, in history."
McManus jokingly added that CBS employees won't get in trouble for watching games online while at work: "At CBS Sports, and probably CBS, anybody that wants to watch the tournament on their computer, we give them special dispensation to do that. We dock them some of their pay, but we make it up in overtime."
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