Activision Blizzard to Publish Daily Live Programming on Facebook
May 12 2016 - 2:37PM
Dow Jones News
By Sarah E. Needleman
Activision Blizzard Inc., looking to draw more eyeballs and
advertising dollars to its competitive-videogame content, plans
next month to begin publishing daily live programming on Facebook
Inc.
The companies announced the collaboration Thursday at the
NewFronts digital-media conference in New York, where Activision
Blizzard pitched marketers on its business of competitive
videogaming, also called e-sports. Activision Blizzard said it is
in talks with marketers about sponsoring the programming.
As it does with all of its partners, Facebook will provide
Activision Blizzard with data on viewership and help it build an
audience for the video, some of which will be exclusive to the
social network and at times featured on Facebook's own sports
page.
E-sports is a fast-growing corner of the $100 billion videogame
industry, in which professional players around the globe vie for
millions of dollars in prize money. Championship matches held in
sports arenas often draw thousands of spectators, while millions
more watch online. Fans are deeply invested players themselves,
honing their skills online.
A finals match for the game "League of Legends" in October
attracted 36 million online and television viewers. Later this
month, Time Warner Inc. will begin broadcasting e-sports
tournaments Friday nights on its TBS cable-TV station.
Facebook, for its part, has been ramping up live video to
compete with rivals such as Alphabet Inc.'s YouTube and Snapchat
Inc. It has pushed tools into its users' hands in recent weeks to
get more of them to create and watch live video, and in some cases
has paid content creators to produce video.
Activision Blizzard plans to publish live content daily -- match
highlights, statistics, expert commentary and player interviews --
on its Facebook page for Major League Gaming, a tournament and
production company it acquired last year for $46 million. Facebook
users who follow the page will be notified of live broadcasts, just
as they do today if they follow pages from the Verge or The Wall
Street Journal, for example.
In an earlier prepared statement, Facebook said e-sports is an
increasing priority. Activision Blizzard has several popular
e-sports franchises in its portfolio, including "Call of Duty," but
plans to cover competitors' games and tournaments, too.
Activision Blizzard and MLG have posted e-sports content to
Facebook for years, but are now taking a more aggressive approach.
"It's remarkably different," said Mike Sepso, senior vice president
of Activision Blizzard's media-networks division and co-founder of
MLG. "We're going to lean into Facebook Live."
The videos will be produced in a format similar to ESPN's
"SportsCenter, " Activision said. When Activision created a new
e-sports division last year, it hired Steve Bornstein, an executive
with deep experience at ESPN and the NFL Network, to run it.
"We have a proven playbook and we will use it to grow e-sports,"
Mr. Bornstein told an audience at the NewFronts event. "We will
deliver meaningful and shareable content."
Write to Sarah E. Needleman at sarah.needleman@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 12, 2016 14:22 ET (18:22 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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