In a recent interview with TapouT Radio, Invicta FC President Shannon Knapp discussed the streaming issues, rumors of a Russian buyout, and what the future holds for the promotion.
Stephie Daniels: You had some issues with the stream at the beginning of the event. Who handled your streamcast and will you continue to stream your events using the same company?
Shannon Knapp: Digital Studio 5A handled our streaming needs. They work for Crave Online and do the Sherdog streams, and handled our first event. As far as the issues, I think we’re going to evaluate some things; what happened, what were our issues, where does the fault belong. So yeah, there will definitely be an evaluation period before a decision is made. He still turned it around and get it fixed.
It was my word to the fans that I was going to deliver a good stream, and when that didn’t happen, I took it quite personal. I can’t promise that it will never happen again, because this is life and things happen, but what I can promise you, is that I will do everything possible to make sure that never happens again. Just know that it affected me greatly, and I will do everything in my power to make sure that I give you all what I say that I’m going to give you.
SD: Were you happy with your numbers?
SK: Once again, we came out and blew away any expectations that I had. Coming into this, I didn’t really have an expectation, but you can always hope that you did as well as you did the last time. We did beyond what we did last time. Myself, my business partner and my staff are ecstatic. The numbers came in and we couldn’t be happier.
As long as those athletes had opportunities, the fights were good, well then, we’re happy. To get the numbers we got, we are elated beyond our wildest dreams. It’s absolutely incredible.
233K is what the first show did. The last show you had people going to the site to watch, then they’d leave, come back and watch some more. This time, we stayed steady and climbing. I don’t want to share the numbers right now, but let’s just say we started where we were the last time, and steadily, across the board, we never dropped. We actually increased the numbers and kept the viewers there. For five hours, people did not move. We drew more in and we never dropped off…
At 5:30 pm we had over 100k people sitting in the queue and my prelims hadn’t even started. At 6 pm, when the event fired off, we had over 200k people hitting the site at once. Did I expect that great a number to hit all at once? Absolutely not. I can’t imagine that the streaming guy quite expected that either. Even with our success the last time, those numbers would bounce up and down, and it wasn’t all at once. Thank goodness for EdgeCast, because they came in and saved the day. The servers pretty much went into complete meltdown, so EdgeCast ended up actually hosting the event. My apologies go out to everyone for any problems or disappointment it may have caused, and I hope that we delivered a quality card, despite the bumpy start. Please be patient with us, because we are a work in progress.
SD: There were some crazy things flying around on Twitter that you might be selling to a Russian organization. Is there any truth to the rumors?
SK: First of all, I haven’t talked to M-1. I’m not doing any business there. Yes, a Russian businessman did call me and ask to buy Invicta. Did I take the phone call? Absolutely. I take any phone call. I’m taking every phone call that comes to me. Does that mean anything? Absolutely not. I am not selling out. I’m keeping to the commitment and promise I made. I don’t know where the rumors are coming from, but I am not selling Invicta.
Invicta FC 3 – Invicta Fighting Championships 3 takes place Oct 6, 2012 at the United States Memorial Hall, Kansas City, United States.
