The International Olympic Committee will provide free live streaming of the 2012 Olympic Games through its official YouTube channel to 64 territories across Asia and Africa.
The live-streaming service will provide exclusive digital access to London 2012 in 22 Asian territories where digital broadcast rights have not already been acquired by the IOC’s broadcast partners, including India, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. YouTube will provide coverage on a non-exclusive basis in 42 sub-Saharan Africa territories.
Viewers from these territories will be able to watch the streams on the IOC’s YouTube channel, accessible online or on internet-enabled devices like smartphones and other YouTube-enabled devices.
The channel will carry 11 different simultaneous high-definition feeds, all with English-language commentary. There will be 10 live feeds from London 2012, running from 9am to 11pm GMT, plus a 24-hour broadcast of the Olympic News Channel, which includes summaries of the latest results, general reports on different events, and interviews with athletes.
Fans in the 64 territories will also be able to catch up on highlights and full events. The channel will also feature historic content from past Olympic Games. In total, the channel will offer over 2,200 hours of coverage from London 2012, including all the medals finals.
Timo Lumme, managing director of IOC television and marketing, said: “We first provided clips on our channel on YouTube during the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games across the region, and since then have continued to provide footage of past Olympic Games across the world on our YouTube channel. Now we will also be able to offer live coverage during London 2012, complementing the excellent coverage provided by our broadcast partners across the world across all media platforms.”
The Asian territories in which YouTube will provide exclusive digital coverage are: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Brunei, Bhutan, Cambodia, East Timor, India, Indonesia, Iran, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritius, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam.
The sub-Saharan Africa territories in which YouTube will provide non-exclusive digital coverage are: Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, São Tomé and Príncipe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.