Periscope, Twitter's video-streaming application, is slowly proving its viability as the app to rely on, especially when it comes to keeping up with what's trending, such as the Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquaio fight.
Some users of Periscope and other live-streaming services like Meerkat streamed live feeds via Twitter during the fight on Saturday that saved viewers $100 in pay-per-view expenses, but this did not bode well for HBO and Showtime, which had exclusive rights to the airing of the boxing match, Bloomberg reported.
The publication said executives of Showtime and HBO requested that the live streaming feeds be removed. Twitter CEO Dick Costolo, meanwhile, proclaimed the effectiveness of Periscope by tweeting that the winner after the fight is the app.
Previously, Periscope was asked to remove leaked live streams of HBO's "Game of Thrones'" first episode, and it complied.
The free views via Periscope of the fight may not cause a major rift in the earnings of HBO and Showtime, but it may cause potential problems for pay-per-view TV shows like "Game of Thrones" or to exclusive previews shown in big conventions like the Comic-Con, Forbes said in a related report.
Forbers contributor Merril Barr said the organizers of Comic-Con would have a tough time policing the use of live-streaming apps during the convention.
In a note to Bloomberg, Shelly Palmer, a media adviser of 21st Century Fox and Viacom, said that after seeing the Mayweather-Pacquaio boxing match at Periscope, it might be close to impossible to regulate the use of such apps.
