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CBS has televised the Masters in every year
since 1956, when it used six cameras and covered only the
final four holes. By 2006 over fifty cameras were in use.
The club awards successive one-year television contracts to
CBS and USA Network. As a result, the tournament is able to
dictate policies such as referring to the gallery as
"patrons" rather than spectators or fans. Gary McCord was
excluded from coverage for making remarks about the course
which the club found disagreeable. The BBC has had the UK
television rights since 1986 and it also provides live radio
commentary on the closing stages on Radio Five Live.
The Masters is one of a very small number of tournaments
broadcast each year in high-definition television. In 2005,
CBS broadcast the tournament with high-definition fixed and
handheld wired cameras, as well as standard-definition
wireless handheld cameras. Each hour of Masters broadcasting
provides only four minutes worth of commercials - something
unseen in modern broadcasting (though in the Martha Burke
controversy years there were no commercials. In Canada,
which shows the same broadcast as the USA does, TSN and
Global added their own commercials during the coverage. The
weekend simulcast on Global was actually against CRTC policy
for signal substitution as the American station was not
showing ads). In 2006 a webstream called "Live at Amen
Corner" provided coverage of all players passing through
holes 11, 12 and 13 through all four rounds. This was the
first full tournament multi-hole webcast from a major
championship.
Unlike the other majors, the number of hours of television
coverage is restricted, perhaps to increase the tournament's
Nielsen ratings. Only in the 21st century did the tournament
allow CBS to air 18-hole coverage of the leaders, a standard
at the other three majors. Only 3 hours of coverage is
scheduled for the early rounds on USA Network, although the
networks always stay past the allotted times until the end
of live golf action on all four days. On American television
coverage of the other 3 majors (and The Players
Championship) only continues until the end of golf action on
Saturday. 2006 was the first year that standard definition
television viewers were able to watch early morning action
from Augusta, as the 3rd round's conclusion was televised at
8am EDT Sunday on USA Network.
Augusta National does not allow any promos for other network
programs, sponsored graphics, blimps, on course announcers
or the regular CBS sports graphics template; instead it uses
its own guitar-driven soundtrack (notably "Augusta" by Dave
Loggins) and a CBS graphic package from several years back,
colored green and white and relegating the CBS logo to a
small corner shadow, allowing the Masters logo to take
precedence.
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