IRI Live Coverage

[JesseK]

I'd like to start a wide-open discussion. Topic: Get IRI covered, with commentators, live on Television. Why IRI specifically? IRI has a staggeringly higher-quality entertainment value than Champs, plain and simple.

But I'll get some selfish reasons out of the way pretty quick.

1. I wasn't able to follow IRI due to work
2. The videos are hard to piece together from YouTube
3. I don't like most live stream sites since they force random commercials at (sometimes) the worst possible times
4. Then there's also a ToS for the live stream sites that states you can't rip the live streams to save off for later

I remember seeing, somewhere, there used to be live ESPN 2 coverage of the FRC World Championships way back when it was in Orlando. Perhaps I saw old coverage of 67 HoT back before the 3v3 format; I don't remember exactly. How hard would it be for the IRI organizers to arrange <insert major broadcaster> support for next year? Qualification matches where a sub-100 score is out of the norm? Sign me up!

Well, then I could at least DVR IRI (ha!).

We [the collective of FIRST] could also work on the 'make it loud' part when there's actually time to do so - during the offseason. It also seems to me that there's a lull in live sports action during late July?

However:

• Who are all of the stakeholders involved in this type of thing? FIRST HQ, The Group Which Makes IRI Happen, The Venue, The Volunteers, The Teams ... anyone else?
• Are there licensing issues that FIRST HQ would bring up?
• A broadcaster, at the end of the day, speaks in the language of dollars. How can we address this with research and our own proposals?
• What were the previous issues with ESPN 2 coverage of Championships, and could any sports or broadcast networks overcome them?
• If this has been discussed before, is anything different (with respect to barriers or benefits) when considering IRI?