When the announcement came earlier this year that the ALMS would only be shown live on ESPN 3, a lot of us felt left out as we are on non-affiliated cable providers. The thought of missing the entire season was disappointing to say the least. Recently, I literally stumbled across a way to view ESPN3 content. We’ve tested this only twice and both times we were successful in being able to view the programming on ESPN3.com. I really hope I’m not screwing the pooch as they say but if it worked for me, perhaps it may work for you.
ESPN offers a premium membership called the “Insider”. It gives you access to a lot of their editorial content. My wife became a subscriber last year to follow their outstanding football coverage. I found that when I visited ESPN 3 on her laptop, it recognized that she was an “Insider” and it allowed me to watch the content. Without the login, it would default to the message that says your provider isn’t affiliated. I tested this over and over on different computers in the house. The only way to see the content was with the Insider Account.
A friend we all know is also not able to get ESPN 3 content, until she used an “Insider” account and it let her right in to watch the ALMS qualifying this evening. So it appears the premium membership account is like being in the VIP no matter who your cable company is.
The “Insider” account info and benefits can be found here: Insider Benefits. Subscription rates start at $6.95 per month and are discounted to $3.33 per month with a 1 year subscription or $2.50 per month for 2 years.
This is not a case of the ALMS or ESPN trying to take you for more money. It’s just a pathway we found to be able to view the American Le Mans Series on ESPN 3. And I again caution you that this has only been tested twice and we are not liable or responsible for any attempt that fails.
Good Luck and Go Corvette Racing!
-
I’m really tired of the Internet providers not getting on the late ’80s (yes, this is late ’80s) technology of multicast backbones like ESPN3.com, fka ESPN360. The same Internet providers complaining about the costs of streaming media are the same ones messing themselves over by not embracing multicast backbones. They make streaming media grossly more efficient by subscribing nodes, everything from computers to cell phones (yes, portable TV will only become a reality this way), to the same, single stream broadcast, instead of multiple, point-to-point unicasts (i.e., “normal Internet traffic”). Both the .MIL and .EDU networks already support many multicast backbones because they drastically reduce bandwidth requirements. It’s honesty sad that it will take federal legislation to get the private industry to embrace a technology that will make things more efficient and lower costs. But then again, the phone companies fought the concept of packet switched networks in the ’60s, including telling the military it could not be done, and thus resulted in the ARPANET project of ’66 (which most people wouldn’t use until 30 years later).
Oh, one more thing. I want to give kudos to ESPN for continuing to not only lead in technology, but not build exclusive-only partnerships. There are other, multicast backbones out there, but they are often exclusive deals with only one Internet provider.
E.g., NFL on Verizon only provides a multicast backbone on Verizon’s wireless network.
ESPN is doing it right, open and public access by offering their multicast backbone it to any provider who wishes to sign up. It’s the combination of gross ignorance and fear of loss of content control that keeps Internet and cable providers from embracing it, when it will solve a lot of the issues they have. After watching this for 2 decades, and only the Military and Education Institutions being forward looking, I’m tired of it.
Imagine being live, at an event, with your mobile phone, not merely just watching the ESPN feed, but subscribing to other content — such as alternative announcers (especially if the locale is not your native language), while subscribing to a chat room of like-minded fans (like other Corvette owners and Corvette Racing fans). That’s what multicast backbones will allow, multiple streams and subscriptions — one for the video, several choices for the audio, and several choices for interactive text. All for less total bandwidth than normal Internet, let alone today’s low-end 3G cell phone tower technology, can easily handle it.
And this is all late ’80s technology, invented over 2 decades ago.
I already pay for ESPN (that I don’t watch) via DirectV. Apparently that is not good enough even tho the fee is a minimal $2.50/month for ESPN3. I’m really tired of being ‘nickeled and dimed’ to death. Everybody is trying to use extra fees to slowly drain my pockets, it would all add up to a substanial amount of money if I let it… No thanks – I’ll pass.
Bryan –
I talked to my ISP/Cable provider about this yesterday, and I’m afraid ESPN here are the jerks. They want to charge the ISP a flat fee for every subscriber to the ISP, whether they watch ESPN3 or not. I’d be happy to pay ALMS to watch the races, but paying ESPN when they’re trying some rather distasteful business practices just isn’t going to happen.
Just tried to access the ALMS race today on ESPN3.com, selected my provider from the list (TWC), and it keeps telling me something about an error.
I call ESPN, tell them what happened.
The answer?
Oh, you have to have TWC as your TV provider too, not just your internet.
I ask the person why they find it a problem that I have DirecTV as my TV provider and TWC as my internet, and I swear I could hear him yanking his shoulders up and down and saying how should I know?
I will NOT be forced into switching ANYTHING.
ESPN3 and ALMS…. you can’t exactly afford to lose more fans, but it will happen if you keep up these foul business practices.
You can also become an insider when you subscribe to ESPN magazine. I bought something at Amazon and there was an offer for a year of ESPN magazine for $6. So, you get access to the content and ESPN3.com. One of the best things about ESPN3.com is that all of last year’s Bowl games are there to watch along with all the games that were on ESPN Game Plan. ESPN3.com plays ALL of ESPN Game Plan’s games plus it has exclusive NCAA football games shown nowhere else. ESPN Game Plan costs like $125/season, big savings. Plus, streaming via HDMI to my TV, the ESPN3 games look better then Dish’s feed of those games I was paying so much for over the past several years.
Didn’t work for me. Not a total waste I guess.
Matt:
I went without as well. First race it failed to work and in fact, it’s not letting me watch anything. It appears related to their recent update. I turned to http://www.justin.tv/rampageturke2 to see the live stream.
Keith
Comments are closed.