Here's an initial report on the experience of watching (or attempting to watch) some events today.

First, I'm having to learn the most efficient way to access the event I want to watch. Perhaps someone with more experience watching games broadcast via Flo can give me some pointers. It's not intuitive for me yet, so I don't want to complain until I'm sure I have a legitimate reason. Having said that, it seems like there are more steps involved than the way I'm used to. For example, I wanted to watch Randolph-Macon men's soccer hosting NC Wesleyan. I went to the RMC website, found the "watch" link and clicked on it. Last year that would have taken me directly to the game. This year it first required me to login to Flo (maybe I'll just stay logged in through the end of basketball season to avoid this step), then there were a couple of additional steps (exactly what they were, I've forgotten) before I got to the game. I only caught the end of the first half, but the actual stream seemed okay, which I understand isn't really Flo's responsibility

Second, I wanted to watch Webster volleyball playing Loras and Bluffton in a tournament at Wash U. The matches were presumably available because when I got to Flo, the icon for each one (a box with the two team logos and a "Watch" link below it to click on) was there. But when I clicked the watch link it went to a screen that said the match was completed (in the case of Loras) or hadn't started (in the case of Bluffton). But both matches were definitely being played at the time I was seeking them because live stats for both were being updated constantly. I suspect this experience means that Wash U wasn't actually streaming these matches, which were likely taking place on an alternate court, rather than on the main fieldhouse court. So, this raise the question of why, if they weren't going to be streamed, they were on Flo's event list for the day.

Seems like there are some things that need to be polished up.

I'll be interested to hear the experiences others are having in finding and watching games on Flo.

^^^ Hope you are right. But the ODAC ditched its ODAC Sports Network to sign on with Flo. Time will tell.

Just saw this reel on Facebook billed as the Top 10 Buzzer Beaters of All Time: https://www.facebook.com/reel/805588488473248

Surprisingly to me, it doesn't include the Jordan Snipes 2005 buzzer beater at RMC: https://youtu.be/y6mRHgUH2H4?si=P7l8cHJGD-B7g2n4

Quote from: Donnie17 on August 26, 2025, 03:49:35 PMThe roster shown has a lot of errors. It lists players no longer with the team and is missing some new players. I bet you are correct in that we will not see the correct roster until next week.

Sounds like you have some inside information. I expect they don't post the roster until a few days before the first game due to the possibility of some attrition that you allude to.

Quote from: rmc1982 on August 26, 2025, 10:56:54 AMI just went online and it SAYS the 2025 roster but when you look its the 2024 roster- maybe theyre updating it now.

When I do the refresh Macon suggests I don't get the 2025 roster. But if I go to the 2023 roster, then go to the 2025 roster, it shows up. Weird, I know. If past years are any indication, they likely won't make it "live" for about another week.

rmc1982, any news on yesterday's RMC/CNU scrimmage?

^^^ Interesting. Thanks for pointing that out. There's even one of those circles for Roller Derby.

Came across this Axios article on sports streaming. No mention of FloSports. I guess they and we (D3) aren't sufficiently big time to get noticed. https://www.axios.com/2025/08/24/sports-streaming-espn-fox-one?utm_campaign=editorial&utm_medium=organic_social&utm_source=x

Wow. That's all quite impressive. I didn't pick up on any mistakes and there wasn't too much redundancy in any of the three. Easy to see why teachers might struggle to detect the use of AI by their students.

My son teaches freshman composition at Arizona State University while getting an MFA in Creative Writing. He has told his students this semester that they cannot use any devices in class and must take notes by hand and is prohibiting the use of AI in completing assignments, which I think he discouraged the past two years but gave some leeway for if any AI generated content was attributed. His rationale is that writing is thinking, thus AI undermines the benefits of doing the work yourself. I wish him luck.

I, personally, have no idea how to even use any of the AI resources available - unless Googling counts. And, being so old, I can't think of any reason why I would want to.

^^^ Thanks. That article is more detailed than I expected, but the absence of any quotes shows that it was clearly written without actually talking to anyone in the program -- head coach, key players named. The author, Briar Napier https://x.com/briarnapier?lang=en has Missouri roots. He likely at least had to do a little work to come up with the "five things you need to know".

^^^ Not getting increasingly boring. I think the only way they might improve is to keep calling it out and pointing out the generic nature and lack of creativity of what they are doing. At this moment there are two headlines on the FloCollege home page about Shenandoah football, but they both link to the same article which, like you have observed, is probably written by AI even though it is credited with the byline of someone named Lindsey Plotkin -- the same person who "wrote" an article about a different D3 football program (can't remember which one). As we all know, the best sources for this kind of information are each individual school's athletic department websites.

Another question to ask is how long are articles even available on the FloCollege website. I can  find nothing about UAA soccer.

^^^ Yes, I remember that close call vs CNU in the playoffs a couple of years ago. I wonder if CNU employs the same approach to the scrimmage, holding back players deemed likely to start. It certainly makes sense to me.

Have you been subscribing to Flo Sports in order to watch your grandson? If so, then the move by the ODAC doesn't affect you, which I think is part of their strategy -- to gobble up conferences then promote their accessibility to all of them. Of course, before Flo came along they were accessible for free. Like so many have mentioned in their comments, this move will impact the casual fans (especially parents and their high school age students) who might have been watching to check out schools' teams they could be interested in attending. Overall, the move to Flo is most likely to reduce viewership of D3 games and harm the division in the long run.

Quote from: jknezek on August 22, 2025, 01:30:28 PMIn lieu of my typical donation to W&L athletics I sent back a nice note telling them to take it out of the money Flo is paying them. I'm suddenly more interested in how my high school teams are doing, and way less interested in D3. Next weekend I'm supposed to drive over toward Atlanta to see the W&L men's soccer team play a couple games. Normally I'd be pretty excited, but I'm just struggling to get up the motivation.

I'd like to go support the team, but if that's all I'm going to see this fall, since I absolutely refuse to pay for nothing more than a gatekeeper, it's a hard sell.

Wow. That's pretty hard core. I kind of struggle with knowing how some of the schools feel about the Flo thing, so I'm trying to give RMC the benefit of the doubt and assume they would just as soon have stuck with the status quo, but had no choice except to go along with what the ODAC was doing. Maybe I'm wrong. But I watch so much of RMC sports that I chose to subscribe for one year, then decide. But if I were mainly a football only fan, like you, (didn't realize you were into soccer, too) I surely wouldn't have subscribed.

^^^ Can you elaborate on: "I would not be surprised if Flo Sports is watching the thread as the d3boards do show up in the search engine."

Quote from: Flying Dutch Fan on August 21, 2025, 01:40:49 PMMIAA press release on an interesting approach to increasing revenue.

https://miaa.org/news/2025/8/21/miaa-launches-new-collaboration-with-brentwood-partners.aspx

Sounds like they're spending money in order to make money. At least with FloSports the schools (and conferences??) simply get money. At least I assume that's how it works. I hope this approach works for the MIAA. Will be interesting to see how it goes.