JetBlue continues to expand the portfolio of free, streaming media available on board its FlyFy-equipped aircraft. The latest partner is MLB.tv which will make its entire content library – live and archived – available for free to passengers on board an equipped JetBlue aircraft.
Passengers who are already subscribers will stream the content just like always. For passengers who have the MLB At Bat app (Android version) but who are not subscribers the JetBlue portal will offer up temporary credentials which will unlock the full content library. And passengers who do not have the app on their device will be prompted to download it, after which the temporary credentials will open up the content.
Unlike the broadcast TV content which is tied to a specific market feed (NYC in JetBlue’s case) and which can have blackouts on local games the MLB.tv service will be blackout-free. Unless MLB learns how to play games on airplanes, at which point I suppose that part of the deal might be revisited.
Much like the Amazon deal announced earlier this year this one allows the carrier to offer up more content to its passengers without charging them. And travelers are big fans of not paying ancillary fees. At the same time it provides a great marketing outlet for the content provider and, in this case, has the added bonus of getting the app installed on to more devices. In the world of mobile apps getting the install is a big win. And the opportunity for MLB to incrementally sell subscriptions on top of that makes the freebies on board a great marketing loss-leader opportunity.
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