How do you consume sports?
If your response includes terms like “streaming”, “mobile”, “video games”, “highlights”, “viral videos”, or simply, “uh, on my Facebook news feed and Snapchat & Instagram stories”, you’re going to be pumped to learn (or re-learn) what we’re doing at ActionStreamer. Check it out.
ActionStreamer brings fans closer to the game
Our core vision was hatched in the middle of the action, in the defensive backfield of the NFL. As fans, gamers, & recreational athletes, we may think we have an idea of what it’s like to be a professional athlete on gameday, but hardly any of us will get to experience the real thing. Dhani Jones, one of our co-founders, did. He played linebacker at the University of Michigan in the late ’90s and in the NFL from 2000–2010, a decade which featured tremendous technological advancements off-the-field, including the rise of smartphones, social media, livestreaming, & action cameras.
By the time Dhani decided to hang up his cleats, he knew a few things: He wanted to travel the globe, he wanted to spread bow ties abound, and he wanted to harness technology to enable fans to experience the biggest moments in sports for themselves. But not from their couches. No, he wanted to transport fans onto the gridiron, between the lines, into the center of it all.
That pretty much sums up our mission at ActionStreamer: To bring you, the fan, closer to the action than ever before, to immerse you within the sports you love, to deliver you onto the field-of-play, and to expose you to the sights, sounds, adrenaline, determination, & jubilation of your favorite players.
Rise of POV video fuels a content revolution
Chances are you don’t remember when you discovered you could send a text with video in it, or your maiden Snapchat or Instagram story, or the first time you tinkered with Periscope or Facebook Live. Whether or not you realized it at the time or even realize it now, these capabilities ushered in a new era, suddenly empowering everyone with a smartphone to be a content creator and to have the power to capture & share content instantly.
GoPro caught fire in 2007, Snapchat exploded in 2012, Periscope was acquired by Twitter in 2015, and by 2016 everyone had the ability to go live on Facebook. Today, billions of videos of people capturing what they’re experiencing on a daily basis are being shared. Point-of-view (POV) video is everywhere. Well, almost everywhere…it’s conspicuously missing from the properties with the most viewership of all: College & professional sports.
Engagement drives the fan relationship
As sports fans, we soak up everything the leagues and their partners offer. Breaking news, merchandise, video games, fantasy sports, social media interactions with players, all-star game voting, local autograph signings, mic’ing up players & coaches, mock drafts, kids camps, HBO’s Hard Knocks, preseason fan fests, ESPYs — college & professional sports go way beyond actual game-play and we can’t get enough; we absolutely love & crave it.
Certain touch-points with our favorite sports, leagues, teams, & players even become tradition — fantasy football draft at your friend’s house, watching the dunk contest with your brother, the Michigan-Michigan State game with your college buddies. Rich experiences & engagement create lasting memories and lasting memories create sports fans for life.
No more technological barriers
So we love POV video and we love access to our favorite college & professional athletes, teams, & leagues. ActionStreamer believes it’s [finally] time to marry the two. POV video has the promise to revolutionize fan engagement, to take it to new heights, and the technological barriers that have long prohibited it are being broken down as we speak.
Today, you can watch your friends play with their pets or run through the park from their perspectives in real time, but you can’t see your favorite running back dive across the goal line or your favorite forward slap a one-timer to the back of the net from their perspectives. We’re determined to change that.
The primary holdups have been hardware size (too bad athletes can’t hold smartphones while they play!) and the limited amount of available bandwidth in stadiums & arenas (don’t you hate when you can’t even send a photo or make a call from your seat?). ActionStreamer is laying the foundation to reliably deliver POV video from the field to the fans.
Remember what it was like to see a professional athlete at the mall and ask them to take a picture with you? Or to get to the park early to watch batting practice and get a ball from a player? Or to reach as far over the railing as possible to receive a high-five from someone on the team as they ran out onto the court? If you grew up an avid sports fan, you’re very familiar with these feelings. In fact, you’re probably reliving those exact moments from your past as you read this (I am!)— the adrenaline rush, the sense of connection, that intersection of fantasy & reality. POV video is primed to revive & revolutionize that very sense of connection between players & fans, to inject those jolts of excitement, wonder, & awe into college & professional sports.
Imagine being able to feel that on a regular basis, every time you watch a sporting event. Watch the biggest moments, but not from your couch, not from the stands, not courtside…from the field-of-play itself, from the vantage point of your favorite players. Step inside their shoes—no, their eyes. Experience together, win together, celebrate together.
Merely the first chapter
These are thrilling times in the evolution of sports viewership & engagement and ActionStreamer is ecstatic to be at the forefront of the space, both via our proprietary technology and by bringing all that resulting content to bear through a variety of strategic partnerships. We’ll dive into more of our business in future posts, so be sure to stay tuned.
