Web users line up for March Madness
Waiting-room line surges above 100,000 potential viewers
By Scott Banerjee, MarketWatch
Last Update: 2:17 PM ET Mar 16, 2006
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- More than 100,000 college-basketball fans lined up on the Internet Thursday to view the first games of the NCAA men's tournament, suggesting enthusiastic early demand for CBS Corp.'s offer to present the games free online.
At 12:45 p.m. Eastern time, with three games in progress simultaneously, the number of fans waiting to see the first-round match-up of Seton Hall and Wichita State spiked as high as 140,000, according to a MarketWatch reporter observing the Webcast.
'We're making adjustments every minute based on how things are holding up.'
Thirty minutes later, the waiting-room line was trimmed to below 49,000 as CBS scrambled to accommodate the surge in interest. Take MarketWatch Poll: How are you keeping tabs on the daytime games?
"We're making adjustments every minute based on how things are holding up," said Larry Kramer, head of CBS's (CBS) digital operations.
The live video streams were running at speeds of 365 kilobits per second, delivering about half the video quality that users would experience when viewing a television. Audio quality was inconsistent, with feeds cutting out for as many as 10 minutes at a time.
"So far everything is going very well except that one sound feed," said Kramer, commenting via e-mail from a CBS control room in Florida.
Kramer said he's prepared for at least 200,000 simultaneous viewers, placing the tournament among the top live online draws of all time. See column by Bambi Francisco.
At 1:25 p.m., a general-admission viewer logging in to watch Oklahoma versus the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee at the half-time break encountered a waiting-room queue of just 247 people.
Not all fans endured equal wait times. Certain "VIP" Web users -- who'd signed up for "March Madness On Demand" before Thursday -- experienced little to no wait to watch the game of their choice.
CBS Corp.'s live streaming of the tournament is accessible free of charge though cbs.sportsline.com, cstv.com and ncaasports.com. End of Story
Scott Banerjee is a reporter for MarketWatch in San Francisco.
I waited less than 30 seconds to get in.
I have zero interest in any of the games that won't be on local TV but I feel like being an ass and keeping my slot just because I have it.
HA HA