Our old friend Shari Redstone put up a trial ballon this week, via Reuter’s. Using the digital projection technology now forcing its way into movie theatres, National Amusements says it wants to present live sports events - in 3-D.

The idea, of course it to compete with home entertainment centers, which the industry partially blames for the 9% drop in ticket sales last year. It’s as if the theatres have resented TV since the fifties and finally they found a way to crush it.

And admit it - as a sports fan, do you want to watch the game on your HD TV with your friends at home, or do you want to be almost literally immersed in the action, surrounded by 400 other fans, getting a better view of the action than people in the stadium? Better even than the players? Oh hell yes.

This is an impossibly good idea. It couldn’t happen tomorrow because the teams are all under exclusive contracts with their various networks, but contracts expire. And there must be some sports - woman’s soccer, anyone? - that would see better money in this venue than on conventional TV. If the idea seems radical, just think of it as pay-per-view on steroids. Barry Bonds volume steroids.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 26th, 2006 at 10:41 am and is filed under General, Motion Pictures, Television. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.