Showtime Sued Over Poor-Quality Mayweather Fight Streams

An Oregon resident who says he paid nearly $100 to stream the Mayweather-McGregor fight through Showtime's pay-per-view app is suing the company for allegedly failing to deliver watchable video.

"On August 26, 2017 at 6pm PST, like thousands of other fight fans across the county, plaintiff turned on defendant’s app in anticipation to watch the Mayweather fight," Zack Bartel alleges in a class-action complaint filed Saturday in U.S. District Court in Portland.

"To his extreme disappointment and frustration, plaintiff (and thousands of other consumers) quickly learned that defendant’s system was defective and unable to stream the Mayweather fight in HD," Bartel alleges. "Instead of being a 'witness to history' as defendant had promised, the only thing plaintiff witnessed was grainy video, error screens, buffer events, and stalls."

He alleges that Showtime knew or should have known that its pay-per-view service lacked the bandwidth to stream the fight as advertised.

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"Defendant intentionally misrepresented the quality and grade of video consumers would see using its app, and knowingly failed to disclose that its system was defective with respect to the amount of bandwidth available, and that defendant’s service would materially fail to conform to the quality of HD video defendant promised," the lawsuit alleges.

He alleges that Showtime violated the Oregon Unlawful Trade Practices Act and is seeking to bring a class action on behalf of all state residents who purchased the $99.99 pay-per-view stream after viewing an add for the app on iTunes.

A Showtime spokesperson said the company doesn't comment on ongoing litigation. The company also reportedly said Monday afternoon that it plans to issue refunds to people who purchased the streams through its own service and were unable to view the fight. Showtime doesn't play to issue refunds to people who purchased access through outside distributors; instead, the company reportedly says those people must ask those outside companies for refunds.

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