Sports content driving technology adoption:
It appears that the online technology world and offline technology world agree on one thing... sports, not sex, sells! The offline world has known this for some time. For years consumer electronic companies have been using sporting events, like the super bowl, to promote the sale of items such as big screen TVs. But now both online media firms (Yahoo!, Real, Microsoft) and offline firms (Samsung, Sony, etc.) are using sporting events to drive the adoption of new technologies.

To spur the adoption of HDTV Samsung partnered with MSOs around the country for a "March Madness" promotion on their HDTVs and cable service. Recently, CBS and the NCAA offered an online video feed of the first few rounds of the NCAA tournament (Note: I used this service and it allowed me to see out of market games... and it ROCKED!). Now MSN, in a similar fashion to RealNetworks strategy last year, is using its deal with MLB to spur the adoption of MSN premium. As firms continue to use major sporting events to drive the adoption of new technologies, consumer will learn to wait for these event before purchasing expensive products like HDTVs.

While I don't have the time to look back on historical data, I wonder how much people would have saved by waiting until March to buy their HDTV set rather than during the holiday season...