This morning we got a gut shot for English-speaking sumo fans as news comes from Jason that he received a copyright strike from Abema. He and other YouTube channels and streams face increasingly aggressive action from Abema now, as well as the NHK. It may not be a coincidence that this is occurring during “the rise of AI.” As I’ve said a few times on the blog and on Twitter, AI is not about intelligence and decision-making, it’s about automation. Just as the music companies employed bots to find their content on YouTube, I would not be surprised at all if AI bots are being used to find things like Abema’s logo and such on videos throughout the service.
My son’s a soccer fan and while a lot of Liga MX content is available on Univision, much more content required a $50/mo Fubo service for TuDN. So when searching for Mexican soccer streams, it was funny to see how many streams on YouTube and Twitch were tilted at a 45 degree angle, cropped slightly, or had images/stickers overlaying the video to avoid detection. I am not sure if that’s the direction sumo streams will go – I’m sure similar gimmicks to avoid detection would work for a while. But like with Mexican soccer, it will only be a matter of time before they caught up, and that was before AI. More creative methods will require more work and more effort from the streamer.
Why am I bringing up Mexican soccer? It’s because people think sumo fans are under attack but my point is that this is a much wider crackdown on copyrighted content and now it’s aided by the best AI tools. It’s not just sumo, folks. My son and I would be watching these Chivas games streamed at a 45-degree angle but they were still getting shut down over, and over. As a fan of Pachuca, it became untenable to watch anything. And that’s something as obscure as Liga MX. Premier League, Bundesliga, La Liga, NFL, NHL, etc…many sports have been going through this. Sumo is not alone.
Face it, many of the big name streaming services are so far losing money hand-over-fist. Paramount, for example, is under discussions to sell. Netflix has far fewer movies than it used to and it’s impossible to find a platform with Bond movies. But anyway, back to sports. In the end, the Mexican soccer fans finally got an alright, affordable streaming service in Vix. Sumo fans are getting a pretty good streaming service from the NHK.
As I’ve said before, if the sumo fan community is going to insist on leading the pirate life and getting everything for free, we’re going to get ignored as far as content goes. I seriously cannot put up with Taylor Swift and the NFL and all of this other mainstream crap that people are apparently throwing money at. Why do you think TV is full of pharma and political ads? It’s because people are spending money on medicine and throwing money at Biden and Trump like it’s the end of the world. There were serious ads about “restless leg syndrome,” for Christ’s sake.
Services go to where markets demonstrate their strength. Konishiki’s tour is an awesome opportunity, as are sumo tournaments, like those in Texas. We have to keep it up!
Anyway, I’m all for people keeping their money in their pockets. But where people spend money, businesses are willing to spring up and take it. The Kyokai is no different as we see whenever Shibatayama oyakata is on TV…usually with some curry or something in hand. When we financially support these services, we will get more attention and more content. Spend money on fun stuff and stuff you enjoy.
I hope the streamers can work something out with the channels like Abema and NHK. There is a massive “value add” in providing content for a new audience in another language. Maybe they would be open to an MOU or something? I just hope there’s a path toward cooperation that benefits everyone. The sumo world relies on the support it receives from its fans. And more and more of those fans are from foreign countries so I am confident that the Kyokai, NHK and Abema will be open to providing more content. Until then, I guess we’ll need to see how things play out.
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I’d be willing to pay if ABEMA were available overseas. You cannot exactly say “nobody overseas is interested in buying my product” when you don’t sell it there. Remember the NSK’s attempt to stream? Their pricing scheme was crazy and it flopped. People pay to sub to the pirate steamers- so there is value to grab. They also don’t put together the amazing value-add content of Natto or Kinta or Midnight’s sense of sumo fan community. They don’t invest. Don’t sell. Don’t care. The last one means that maybe they could just leave well enough alone.
I think the evidence is there that the Kyokai and the NHK do invest and care. I’m guessing but I think the NHK was stuck in contracts with cable and they’re out now…thus Jme. And if the NHK was stuck in contracts then the Kyokai would be, too. I mean they can’t undercut the NHK and Abema.
Many do pay the streamers but I don’t know how many and how much they were paying. But I definitely think that the Sumopedia is a great value add content from the NHK. The Kyokai has their English language website…though improvements come in fits and starts. The improvements and content ARE there, however.
Some of the content NHK provides is really nice, but what they don’t provide is a community, in fact, they are actively obstructing that. That’s why I hope those content creators can find a place.
If there was a reasonable on demand service offered in Europe, I would book that and still wanted to see natto or Jason. They add flavour, they add additional information. Things don’t need to be free.
I agree with you, but community doesn’t need to depend on illegal streams. We see it here on Tachiai, GSB, Sumo Mainichi, Kaboom etc. And we see it in other sports all the time – there are ‘watch-along’ streams on YouTube, live spaces on X or Discord or Telegram etc… There’s an amazing community of Italian fans led by Italianozeki with lively Telegram channel. They offer a lot of stuff to fans and supporters without having to battle with streams and takedowns etc. I love Jason and others and I’m thankful for the work they do and they passion they put in it. I’m sure the communities they build will survive and flourish even in a future with better legal streaming options.
Let’s be honest though, a lot of today’s sumo fan communities only exist because of all the availability of illegal near-live video coverage serving as a necessary backdrop to those communities’ extended coverage. I’ve been around long enough to remember the times when something like Tachiai’s daily makuuchi summaries was how the majority of the online sumo fans were following the sport. It takes a rather different level of commitment to stay interested in a sport when all you can do is read about it.
So, sure, the existing communities would flourish if better legal streaming were available. But as it stands, the more relevant question is how they would fare with no illegal or legal streaming available, because that would be the unfortunate reality in most places in the world right now if the illegal sources completely went away. (I think most legal scholars would say that accessing Abema through VPN for personal use isn’t illegal, but there’s a significant technological hurdle there since Abema is very good at banning VPNs.)
I highly doubt that any contracts with specific distribution systems were involved in the decision to shut down TV Japan / JSTV, there are just far too many in existence across all the countries where these premium services were offered. It also wouldn’t explain why NHK decided to kill off those brands altogether rather than just “move” them to the internet.
The ABEMA app seems to be available worldwide on ios not sure about android. No subscription needed, only VPN. Nordvpn works flawlessly and costs next to nothing.
I agree with your point – I don’t think sumo is especially targeted. What’s frustrating is that there is no legal way of watching the NHK Live English commentary for the 15 days. We know that it’s there, but it’s only broadcast outside Japan on 3/4 days. I really don’t like having to look for random streams when I know Murray Johnson & co. are doing a live commentary. Even if I subscribed to a cable service that included NHK, I wouldn’t be able to see it. During the last 30 minutes of Day 11 (16:30 Japan time) NHK will broadcast Day 10 highlights + Sumopedia. I don’t know why that is, but it’s frustrating. Many fans would be willing to pay for a dedicated service, whether it’s NHK or Kyokai or others. But my impression is that us fans are still a niche compared to more safe cable contracts. I really hope that one day NHK offer live coverage or at least same-day on demand. Or maybe a dedicated sumo-app! With official Kyokai fantasy-games! LOL
There is a completely legal service in the US and Canada. I literally watched it live last night and listened to Murray. Full 2 hours of Makuuchi. No vpn. NHK will then rebroadcast it 4 times each day. That is via NHK’s jme.tv service.
https://tachiai.org/2024/05/03/new-ad-free-streaming-sumo-option-for-natsu/
I’m in the UK. Here NHK is available as a live stream on TV and on a free app. However, they do not stream live commentary every day. They stream highlights at 17:30 UK time and other times in the evening. However, highlights are not available on demand until the following day. When I started following sumo, I was happy with daily highlights recorded on TV and of course Tachiai’s excellent coverage. As I became more passionate about it I wanted to follow every day live. For the UK, the sole NHK Premium service listed in the link above is only accessible through the NHK channel on Freeview TV (so only through an aerial-connected TV). It won’t work on TV just connected to the internet (like mine) or on any other devices. The price is also very high (£19.90/month – ~$24) for an offer that doesn’t even have any internet only or multi device capability. That’s not the main point – the main issue is that I can’t access it as things stand. I would consider Jme.tv or other streaming services I could use on multiple devices etc. It looks like those NHK Premium services are offered at 19.90 across the world, but this is not how well structured global streaming services work – $20 for a US household are not the same of €20 for an e.g. Estonian household. I appreciate that some fans have unrealistic expectations, but piracy can be defeated offering content on a reliable platform at a reasonable price. I’m not sure NHK Premium (as it stands) is it. [E.g. I have TNT Sports here in the UK. I watch lots of sports including Italian football (soccer), The Champions League, Europa League, MLB, NBA, Cycling and a ton of other content (across multiple devices and in UHD) for £29.90 a month. Would it be reasonable to pay £19.90 for NHK Premium to watch sumo only live on my TV? Probably not].
I tried one of the options for Europe, Tivify, that I found here
https://nhkworldpremium.com/en/apply
It gives the 2 hours of the top division every day.
It has two language options: Japanese and Original.
Japanese is the default and is what you would think, pure Japanese commentary.
Original on the other hand gives both Japanese and English commentary at the same time. A little bit distracting. So there is some improvement required here, but if one does not require the English commentary, then there are no problems.
Japanese AND English at the same time? Yeah, that’s a bug. I would reach out to the Tivify tech support and see if they can resolve it. It will be good to know how responsive tech support is. When I first got Jme, there was a bug that I had to report and Jme were very responsive. I think the schedule for one of the channels was missing or something. They reported it through Twitter and resolved it. Let me know what your experience is with Tivify tech support. I don’t want to encourage people to use them if they suck, frankly.
The request for fixing the issue is in. We will how it goes.
Furthermore Tivify seems to have a possibility to record the broadcasts, so through that there is a possibility of re-broadcasts of the event. I will try it tomorrow to see how it goes.
Another good feature is that you can install Tivify app to anything running Android. Probably Apple would work, too, but I have only tried it with Android devices and web live in Chrome.
Oh, that’s nice. I’m really curious about the recording feature because DVR capability is something that others had mentioned.
Recording functions ok. They 60h capacity for recordings and they are saved for 30 days after which old recordings get removed. So one can save the whole basho if one wishes.
I got an answer to the language problem. They are looking into the issue. At this point I do not expect them to be able to fix it before this basho ends. But if they fix it before Nagoya basho starts, I would think it reasonable.
That recording capacity would be put to the test if they start offering lower division coverage. I really want to push that.
We would be more than willing to pay if that was an option. We don’t care about free, we care about seeing Juryo on down and ALL the top level matches.
All top level matches are available on the Jme.tv service. Their website also posts Juryo and Makuuchi bouts quickly after they finish.
The Sumo Association’s Japanese language YouTube channel does a live stream of the last hour of each night with commentary from an oyakata. It is only the last hour, it is in Japanese and it’s only a quarter of the screen, but it won’t go down. Plus they upload full screen video of several matches a few hours later.
Interesting. I didn’t know about that. I’ll check it out.
Fans outside of Japan and the US & Canada don’t even have any legal options to watch live sumo, so we depend on illegal streams to get anything beyond 30 mins highlights with a whole day delay. I would be happy to pay for that new service that’s available in North America now, and I bet so would many other sumo fans in Europe and the rest of the world. But unfortunately for NHK/Abema/the JSA/whoever makes these decisions we simply don’t seem to exist.
Which country are you in? There are some options. https://nhkworldpremium.com/en/apply
Austria (Europe) would cost €19.90 monthly for NHK. If they would provide a service similar to Natto, maybe. Therefore, no.
€19.90/mo for legitimate, ad-free live sumo or…Natto. Seriously, what is it about Natto? The graphics? The stats? I want to make these demands coherent so I can call someone up and say, “I’ve got X readers on my website who want sumo coverage but they’re not happy with your offering.”
Edit: Asashosakari caught that the multiple replays was available on JME. Replays of that variety would then rely on DVR. I’m not sure if that is available with the €19.90 service.
The comprehensibility. The stats. The availability of Makushita. The format (1 day per division). The fact that I can read English (even Natto’s 😊) but not Japanese (the links you provided show no option for switching to non-Japanese).
PS; I do not care for “live”. I cherish my sleep. But I want a usable, comprehensible digest.
So what is it about this digest which is unacceptable? https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/tv/sumo/
No Day 10. No Juryo. No Makushita. No stats per rikishi. No stats per division.
That’s the specificity which is helpful. Thank you.
If this was available same day (even with something like 12 hour delay from live) and there were similar digests for Juryo and Makushita, I’d be happy. I try to watch all of Juryo every day, plus Makushita bouts that involve notable rikishi and/or are relevant to the yusho and promotion races (that’s the material for those posts).
Multiple replays of the live broadcast? That’s only on JME, not other platforms that might be offering NHK World Premium.
Ah! Good catch! Apologies.
FYI I know it has a silly name but Restless Leg Syndrome is a Neurological disease that can be extremely debilitating. Like must be heavily drugged on Vicodin or other narcotics to ever get any sleep levels of debilitating. They are just now developing some new solutions, hence all the ads for it.
There are hundreds of debilitating diseases. New ones discovered every year. Still, why the ads for medication? Who is the best POC for diagnosing your health issues? Your doctor or the ad break during Dr. Phil?
No disagreement here at all on that or how it impacts the costs of our health care system.
Just saying its less ridiculous than the ads for hair loss, d*ck pills, and diet drugs (for those without serious health problems/risk). :)
Leg cramps and insomnia are indication of magnesium deficiency. Why not try some daily magnesium supplements first to cure, rather than rushing to take a pharmaceutical product which no doubt has risks of toxicity?…..
Yeah, it isn’t cramps. There are other interventions people try first… I don’t see anyone here suggesting people start with hard drugs.
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/restless-legs-syndrome/symptoms-causes/syc-20377168
I pay $80usd a month for what is legally available in my country on NHK World Premium. During the real time Sanyaku on Day 10 I get to watch an abbreviated 30minutes covering the whole Makuuchi from Day 9. And that is literally the only legal option to watch Sumo in my country. It’s no wonder people choose to watch via illegal live streams. I kind of feel justified watching the coverage on youtube because I am being royally ripped off to watch an extremely sub-par offering legally. That being said I’ve noticed a lot of what you mentioned in the streams over this Basho, tilted screens, stickers covering any abema or NHK logos, even the commentary box. I don’t even want English commentary give me the standard Japanese broadcast! JSA please give me a link where I can pay an outrageous fee to watch the whole days stream in my country and I will give you whatever you are asking!
That’s terrible. And very expensive. It sounds like the situation in the US until a few months ago. What country, if you don’t mind my asking?
I’m in Australia. Looking at the link provided above I might be able to get access for cheaper now, at the moment NHK World Premium is only available in an extended cable TV package but if I can get it on this Flip thing maybe I could shed a lot of that package. It’s still paying $20usd a month for a sub par experience. I’m happy to pay more than that but not for abbreviated day old highlights.
I would be very interested if you find the Flip thing works. Any feedback on these is appreciated, and the more specific, the better.
Abbreviated, day old highlights like what is available for free here? https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/tv/sumo/
Yes just like that. To me and the level of interest that I have, coverage of this quality isn’t enough. I want to see Juryo, I want to see the full lead up to the tachiai, I think there’s a lot to be seen beyond just the actually match up. I will give flip a try (and pay $20usd for that same day old abbreviated coverage) but only to justify supporting a youtube streamer that shows the entire day from Makushita to the final bout.
It’s a day later and at least as of Jonidan the YouTube streams are back. The only punishment is channel removal with no restriction on starting a new channel which doesn’t seem like much of a deterrent. This happens three times a year and it’s always a crisis until the next day. Yes it can feel like you’re playing Whack-A-Mole trying to watch sumo, but it will be there. I understand that there are sumo content creators like Jason that can’t afford to lose their channels. He has spent a lot of time and effort creating a community and that shouldn’t be discounted. However it doesn’t seem like borrowing content from national broadcasters is a sustainable model. I hope our friends in the sumo content world take this not as an attack on their contributions to the sport, but an opportunity to evolve into something that is both valuable and enjoyable to foreign sumo fans as well as being acceptable to copyright holders.
I do contribute to a streamer via subscription for sumo viewing, and the price feels about right because i can never stay up for makuuchi (or often juryo for that matter) anyways. I watch the streaming at night and sometimes chat ( when i’m feeling like it ) followed up by highlights in the morning of juryo and makuuchi mostly. This is the best setup for my time zone that i’ve found. I suppose i could be bitching about the price of 300 a year when i’m not really watching the top div live anyways, but i still think it’s cool that they started the jre.tv and might sign up when i’m retired as i would have more time to watch the rebroadcasts the following day. I agree that people start moaning whenever there’s change ( change is bad! and get off my lawn you kids! ) but we should be encouraged that more options (official ones ) are being made available. Hope it continues!
Would you mind sharing which streaming service you use? If not, that’s fine. I just like to hear the feedback on which services are good and which have problems. Sounds like that price is in line with the jme.tv service.
Twitch mostly, sometimes YouTube when there’s problems occasionally.
You pay Twitch and YouTube streamers roughly the same amount as a jme.tv subscription?
I don’t pay on YouTube, only twitch and it’s probably a 1/4 the price ( if you do 6 months at a time) of jme’s price. It was the only viable option when I started following sumo, and has been a great resource for learning about the sport. Generally a very positive community.
The community is definitely a missing piece when watching on “TV” or something like that. I know many have gone to Discord and such, like Natto has one.
From what I’ve heard we’re fortunate here in Korea. NHK (one of them) is full service 24 hrs, so we get the basho 16.00-18.00 local (& Japan) time.
I’m one of the people who doesn’t care about live streams – I’m in Europe, Makuuchi is at 8-10 AM when I have other things in my life going on. In fact, I wouldn’t really want full streams either, because it’s just too much time out of my day for 15 days. The 30-minute digest with all the bouts is the perfect format for me, so I still watch Natto. If the NHK highlights were posted on the same day, that would be a good replacement. (Though I do strangely prefer listening to the Japanese commentary, even though I don’t understand it. Also, Natto’s stats are superior. But these are minor quips, what mainly prevents me from going legal is the 1-day delay. Also, I sometimes like to watch Juryo as well which the NHK site does not provide.)
Excellent, specific feedback. Thank you. That’s something I can stick my teeth in.
Interesting that NHK links to Flip but there’s nothing on the Flip site about how to subscribe to NHK Premium or how much it would cost. It seems to be mainly a data provider. I understand that most of this debate focuses on the US and Europe but, in Australia, as far as I can tell, there is no viable option to stream live sumo except illegally. That’s a pity because there are plenty of fans here and the time zone is perfect, most of the year is just an hour’s difference. I would happily pay for a quality service and given the niche sports that are streamed live here – darts? handball? – it’s a puzzle why there isn’t one. Until then, long live Midnight and Natto…