Microsoft's Silverlight to deliver NCAA March Madness on Demand in HD

Fantastic news, cube dwellers -- you can finally put that office T1 to use this year, as CBSSports.com has inked an agreement with Microsoft that will enable it to provide a 1.5 megabits per second stream of March Madness. In other words, you'll be able to watch the 64 most deserved teams scrap it out online in HD for that all important National Championship. Employers, hear this: just go ahead and give your folks a few days off. It's not like they'll be even remotely productive with MMoD coming at 'em in high-def.

[Via ZatzNotFunny]

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 17th 2009 10:40PM]

Ummm... thanks for the NC State vs UConn pic. being a uconn fan in raleigh, that just hurts. :)

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 18th 2009 6:44AM]

Again, sir, your taste in photos is impeccable! Imagine opening EngadgetHD and seeing Julius Hodge. Well done. :)

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 18th 2009 9:09AM]

That's great and all, until you consider how many people can't install Silverlight on work PCs without admin access. I've found out to get Firefox, ESPN 360, and a number of other installations without admin rights, but no such luck on Silverlight. Too bad too, I'd really like to watch Netflix at work.

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 18th 2009 12:14PM]

It sounds like someone needs to become good friends with his IT department. Rule #1 at any company is to take the Network,Server and desktop administrators out to lunch as soon as possible. It will make your life so much easier!

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 18th 2009 2:25PM]

This is bad for Linux users. There is a plugin called Moonlight that enables Silverlight for Linux but it's not fully compatible with 2.0. It does work with Silverlight 1.1 quite nicely.

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 18th 2009 5:42PM]

1.5mb/s 720p? Pretty weak especially for a fast sport like basketball. I realize it is done to make it more streamable for some users but a 3mb/s+ version would be much more ideal.

[ctmike78 Posted Feb 18th 2009 8:49PM]

Ouch, Darren... my dad is an NC State grad, and I'm a UConn grad... that one hurt. :)

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 19th 2009 8:35AM]

Ah yes. The UConn game. The one upset in the entire Herb Sedek tenure.

[(Unverified) Posted Feb 18th 2009 11:43PM]

They need this for Sunday Ticket! I would gladly pay $400 for the full sunday ticket package if it meant no directv. right now we're stuck with directv during football season and I see no point in that...i just want the football games.

And no we don't have cable. TV sucks, save for football in HD.