An estimated 200,003 people fought their way through bachelorette parties and Nashville traffic on Thursday night to secure the best possible spot to view the NFL draft on their 6-inch cellphones.
One couple came all the way from Germany to enjoy the festivities on their 10.5-inch iPad. "We were lucky. We found a great spot just five blocks from the stage. The WiFi connection was incredible," said the fans from Busendorf.
City officials give much of the credit to Comcast who sacrificed bandwidth from local paying customers to offer free WiFi access to all draft attendees. Most visitors felt the provided WiFi was adequate, but a few are requesting compensation for the parts of the live streams they missed due to buffering.
The draft continues through Saturday and is expected to draw record crowds. Fans outside of Nashville can experience the identical broadcasts on ESPN, ABC, the NFL app, the ESPN app, Facebook, Twitter and many more.