Sling TV Faces Streaming Errors During Final Four Games

Many subscribers to Dish Network’s nascent online video service Sling TV saw error messages on the night of April 4 as they tried to stream the Final Four semifinal games of the men’s college basketball tournament. The games, which included a late thriller between Wisconsin and Kentucky and an earlier contest featuring Duke and Michigan State, were aired on Time Warner’s Turner cable networks. Customers took to Twitter to express their frustration, with some saying they would cancel service. Sling TV, which hasn’t disclosed its subscriber numbers since launching in February, apologized in a tweet Saturday night and said basketball fans saw error messages due to “extreme sign-ups and streaming.”

The company said its engineers “rebalanced load across network partners.” Dish said in a statement on April 5 that it “experienced an unprecedented combination of new customer signups and high levels of viewership,” which stressed its systems. It said the streaming experience was “spot on for the vast majority of our customers” and it was able to improve the experience for affected customers during the evening. The satellite-TV provider has been ramping up marketing of Sling, and the National Collegiate Athletic Association men’s basketball tournament is one of the major programming assets it secured in a recent distribution deal with Turner. The streaming traffic jam illustrates the hurdles Web TV still needs to surmount. Other media companies, including Time Warner’s HBO and Walt Disney Co.’s ABC, have faced similar technical problems during airings of highly anticipated events like the Oscars.