Promoters fight back against Mayweather-Pacquiao piracy

Floyd Mayweather Jr. defeated Manny Pacquiao on Saturday to become the welterweight world champion, but the next fight could be between promoters and streaming sites.

While many consumers purchased the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight from their cable or satellite company for about $100, many other viewers watched illegally using streaming sites like Periscope and Meerkat.

Such sites allow users to share footage from their mobile devices on social media, with Periscope's streams lasting 24 hours and Meerkat's disappearing at the end of the recording, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Ahead of the fight, Showtime, HBO and fight promoters filed a joint lawsuit against several streaming sites, demanding relief from copyright infringement.

“The fight will be fixed as an audiovisual recording by a single authorized camera and production crew at the same time it is being transmitted live to consumers throughout the world via licensed pay-per-view access,” the lawsuit states.

It goes on to say that “anticipated infringement” by the streaming sites “not only denies Plaintiffs the benefits of their exclusive rights in the coverage granted by the Copyright Act, but it threatens to irreparably harm Plaintiffs’ valuable relationships with their authorized television carriers and with consumers.”