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Bit Of A Yarn

Dean McKenzie: WHY THE F CAN I NOT WATCH A RACE ON MY PHONE WITHOUT 5 SECONDS OF BUFFERING?


Chief Stipe

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Yeah, same - just get the rolling circle thing, can take up to 1 min + just to load page. Was at Alex Lone Star last year with a relative & we both tried to get the odds from both our different phones and do you think either of us could get anything. Nope. Anyway think they have TAB machine there and easy to access odds so don't have to rely on phone if go there again. 

Its def a challenge trying to watch a race from ph, usually just watch from HRNZ page. Good to hear tho that I-phones re Newmarket don't have issues, interesting. Used to have an I-phone. 

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I wouldn't be surprised that all the elite well paid at TAB NZ had corporate supplies iPhone's.

Explains why they haven't tested the system on Android phones.

In my opinion the problem is the High Definition that they stream in.  Also it gets worse when there is a big race on.

Nothing to do with access bandwidth either has I've tested widely different access speeds and there is  no difference.

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To be fair it's not only an issue with the TAB , i no longer get to watch EPL or the NZ cricket team as our broadband is so weak , i'm 5 mins outside of town , and not the only one . I tried the 7 day free trial with Spark when they first got the football but after 30 mins of watching but seeing only about 6 mins of footy because of the amount of buffering i just gave up .

Everybody wants you to use their products but very few provide the level of service that deserves your custom .

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56 minutes ago, nomates said:

To be fair it's not only an issue with the TAB , i no longer get to watch EPL or the NZ cricket team as our broadband is so weak , i'm 5 mins outside of town , and not the only one . I tried the 7 day free trial with Spark when they first got the football but after 30 mins of watching but seeing only about 6 mins of footy because of the amount of buffering i just gave up .

Everybody wants you to use their products but very few provide the level of service that deserves your custom .

The TAB are providing the product to their customer.  They have a duty to provide a service.  The fact is they pay SPARK and NEP to deliver a streaming broadcast of their product.  They pay 10's of millions of dollars to these two suppliers therefore on behalf of their customers and industry stakeholders in general they should be demanding a quality service fit for purpose.

If I was on the Exec of TAB NZ I'd be hammering my IT team daily and have CTJ (come to Jesus) meeting with both SPARK and NEP.

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Actually I've just had a thought about this problem.  A couple of posters have said that they have found that if they stream from the HRNZ or Loveracing websites they don't have a problem whereas if they use the TAB app they do.  I use the TAB app to view the races.  Perhaps it is a conflict with the TAB app rather than the streaming per se.  

SLB do you use the TAB app to watch the NZ races?

I'll test the alternative streaming at some stage.  Thinking through this scenario it makes sense.  The streaming would be an add on to the App and not part of the original OpenBet package which begs the question what did we actually get for the $50m + $20m installation + $17m a year? 

Perhaps the streaming service is external to the App and the refreshing of data and odds on the App conflicts with bandwidth usage.  That makes sense too considering there seems to be a pattern with the buffering and refresh rates of the App.  I must check the coding of the pop up screen to see where the destination is.

Those that use the App will notice that the menu can take you to a static website rather than staying within the App for things such as results but only if you click the "Results" tab.  If you click on each race after it has been run you will stay within the App but get a different view of the results i.e. you will see the first 4 in the top half vs only the first 3 on the static site plus times and margins on the App but not on the static site.  All a bit of a mess really!

Mmmm I wonder if there is some machinations going on behind the scenes to flick the broadcasting off the TAB NZ books and shift it to the codes?  You all know the management speak for this - "we are focussing on our core competency which is wagering", "we are not in the business of broadcasting", "the codes own the information and therefore are the logical organisations to broadcast"....etc.

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2 hours ago, Chief Stipe said:

Mmmm I wonder if there is some machinations going on behind the scenes to flick the broadcasting off the TAB NZ books and shift it to the codes?  You all know the management speak for this - "we are focussing on our core competency which is wagering", "we are not in the business of broadcasting", "the codes own the information and therefore are the logical organisations to broadcast"....etc.

If that is their long game then they should be careful they don't go screwing themselves . My argument would be , you are taking my money for a wager , it is your job to provide me with a forum on which to follow my money . 

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9 minutes ago, nomates said:

My argument would be , you are taking my money for a wager , it is your job to provide me with a forum on which to follow my money . 

But they don't have any involvement with broadcasting those Sports that they provide books on.  For example the Polish Women's Volleyball League.

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Thought you would come back with that , the majority of the larger sports that they accept betting on and have a partnership with were in large part already getting TV coverage .

My biggest beef with it all is that the TAB and NZ racing went hand in hand but now we are just their poor cousins . That very long term association should carry a massive amount of weight . We are after all fundamentally the industry they are funding with their profits , one of the reasons the codes should have a lot more say in the way the TAB is managed .

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21 minutes ago, nomates said:

My biggest beef with it all is that the TAB and NZ racing went hand in hand but now we are just their poor cousins . That very long term association should carry a massive amount of weight . We are after all fundamentally the industry they are funding with their profits , one of the reasons the codes should have a lot more say in the way the TAB is managed .

Don't get me wrong.  I don't disagree with your sentiment.  I'm just pointing out the duplicity of it all including the lack of customer service!

The sleight of hand with the pushing of costs off the TAB NZ accounts out to the Codes is a dangerous trend and I fear more of it will occur.  That will be supported by the Thoroughbred code as they have a sense of entitlement "we funded the setup of the TAB not Harness and Greyhounds" and they have the resources to squeeze out the other codes.  Notice how the marketing broadcasts of Weigh In and the Box Seat have been pushed out to the codes and even further out to the industry paying.  It won't be long before the only marketing and promotion you see from TAB NZ is purely wagering related - actually in writing that I'm thinking that they've got there already!

Again the rationale and corporate speak will be "we are a wagering company" and the promotion and marketing of individual sports is not our core competency.  Shoot it won't be long before they will be charging Sports and Racing Codes the privilege of using their monopoly!  

I'm picking there is going to be a big scrap for Race Broadcasting soon.  TAB NZ obviously don't want a bar of it.

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At the end of the day it all comes out of the same pool of cash , just be shown on different books . For me they are joined at the hip , always have been , therefor the TAB needs to understand exactly why they exist .

This is where a strong racing minister steps in and tells them they are a " partnership " start working like it . He wont , exactly why a racing minister isn't relevant .

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Just now, nomates said:

At the end of the day it all comes out of the same pool of cash , just be shown on different books . For me they are joined at the hip , always have been , therefor the TAB needs to understand exactly why they exist .

Again I don't disagree.  However TAB NZ as an entity is still trading essentially insolvent.  The majority of revenue they earn doesn't come from NZ Racing - that was clearly evident during Covid-19 lockdown!

They have already started pushing costs to the codes.  For example no on-course presenters instead they are now based in a mini-studio at Te Rapa!

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They can push everything they want onto the codes , all that does is make their books look better , it's still all money that was or will go to he codes .

Perhaps that is all they want to achieve , make themselves look like they are doing better . But at the end of the day doesn't matter how the pie is sliced up costs wise , the revenue they have made will be the same through a season whether they have the cost of broadcasting or not , if not they have more to throw at the codes to provide broadcasting .

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Again I agree Nomates.

But shouldn't the industry stakeholders be involved in determining the strategy whatever it is?

It is a statutory organisation that only exists through an Act of Parliament.  Given it supposedly has a monopoly in NZ shouldn't any pending strategic decisions be put up for public discussion?

For example they pushed the marketing of racing out to the codes.  I dont believe that was explicit in the Messara report.  Now we have NZTR spending North of $2m+ on a new computer system from OZ.  Where was the industry discussion on that?

Back to my old chestnut - why the secret squirrels around the AWT track business cases?  Where is the transparency?  I note there doesn't seem to be much happening at Awapuni yet with regard to their AWT!

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Back to the Topic of the thread.  Just did some tests.  Yep if I Trackside streaming via the Loveracing website a).  I dont have to prove I have money in my TAB account; b).  There is zero buffering in small or full screen.

Test from the same location using the TAB App and I get appalling buffering.

So not my phone and not the connection.

Further checked against TV - 7 second delay between Loveracing stream, 3 seconds TAB App.  For the sake of 4 seconds and having full screen streaming on my phone without buffering then I'll happily be 7 seconds late.  Given there is a delay between when they stop taking bets, 15 second delay after the start to update the final prices and when the race is run.

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