The president of Top Rank Inc. said the company plans to pursue legal action following widespread piracy of Saturday’s Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight on video-sharing smartphone apps and websites.
Rather than pay the $100 pay-per-view fee to watch the fight at home, many people watched streams of the fight on video-sharing apps such as Periscope and other technology.
Todd DuBoef said Top Rank, co-promoter of Saturday’s blockbuster fight, plans to pursue legal action against video-sharing companies and individuals it determines were illegally streaming the fight.
“We’ll have to pursue any people who are allowing people to distribute something that is behind a proprietary wall,” DuBoef said. “We’ll have to challenge those technology companies that are facilitating it and we’re going to have to take a legal position against them.”
Officials with Periscope and its owner, Twitter, did not respond to requests for comment.
Periscope is a smartphone app that allows users to share live video with other users. People who bought the fight were able to record it with their smartphones and stream it live on Periscope and other sites.