I enjoyed the conversations discussing my position on NBA Players in the Olympics. The sports world is its own social network where much is said , written and quickly forgotten about anything and everything that can be argued about. My last post included.
The sports world however is on an amateur scale when it comes to arguing for the sake of arguing compared to the world of technology fanboys. They are about to see just how overmatched they are
It all starts with this "No Olympics video is allowed to be shown online on any website other than NBCOlympics.com"
Translated, this means that no Olympics video is allowed on Youtube, Veoh or any video sharing site. It means that if you are an Olympic athlete and you want to post video of your Gold Medal winning, world record performance on your Facebook or Myspace page, those sites may just get a takedown notice saying you dont have those rights, leaving the dreaded "this video has been removed....." text in its place.
If you stayed up all night to watch an amazing finish to an event that you wanted to share with friends, forgettaboutit. Unless you plan on making an expensive fair use legal argument, you re going to be running afoul of the NBC legal department.
For all things Olympics video online, its NBCOlympics.com or nothing.
All of which is fighting words to the very vocal the internet and Youtube can do no wrong fanboys. They will scream, yell and comment spam and response video to the point of hyperventilation. They will do interviews on every sports, technology and cable news show. It will become a multi platform, multi media issue. They will be loud
It will also send the message to the sports world that the Olympics is driven by money. A fact that will resonate every time someone watches the Olympics, except hopefully between the gun and the tape and the starting and ending whistles of events. Which of course means it will be sports talk radio fodder 24x7 on every radio dial in every city in America with ESPN segments everywhere covering the "controversy"
The Olympics will of course be a major topic of conversation this summer, it will be interesting to see how much of the conversation will be about the athletes and which world, technology or sports will have more influence on NBC and their policies.
NBC vs Fanboys vs Sports Talk Radio vs The Olympics
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(Page 1)2. Love your blog ... especially because you get it.
NBC has a real surprise coming when they see the flood of Olympics video that comes from non-NBC cameras. Not sure how they think they have that stopped (I'd rather stop the tide in San Francisco Bay). They may think they can control their product ... but user-captured video is going to blow their minds.
This should be most amusing.
Posted at 8:33PM on Jun 29th 2008 by Marty Heyman
3. I would have to agree. NBC still doesn't have it figured out. They will learn the hard way...kinda like the RIAA.
Posted at 8:45PM on Jun 29th 2008 by Eric Ogunbase
4. Old media....when will they ever learn?
Posted at 8:46PM on Jun 29th 2008 by GO Zone Preconstruction
5. I think you're a bit wrong on this one Mark. What you predict would happen, but tech fanboys don't care about the Olympics. I'm sure they have a wonderful audience of 65 year old ladies who watch the gymnastics and oogle the swimmers in Speedos, but how many of them are tech fanboys? The Olympics have been a joke since '84.
Posted at 9:09PM on Jun 29th 2008 by Micah Seymour
7. I can guarantee that there will not be a single article on this topic in the mainstream press or on ESPN. This is not an important issue with the general public. They simply do not give a shit where the video is located, as long as they can see it.
Posted at 9:54PM on Jun 29th 2008 by Matthew
8. Ok, fine I'll play the devils advocate for this one. I don't think NBC is doing anything wrong. Sure, I believe some small scale sharing between fans should be allowed as long as there's no money being made off it but honestly they're paying like a bazillion dollars for it so NBC has every right to do this. All I ask is if you're going to ban olympic footage on YouTube NBC you f-ing better have a good, easy to use video player on your website that WORKS.
@Ogunbase:
How is this like the situation with the RIAA? The RIAA's mistake was not selling music online until it was too late and what lesson will NBC learn? That letting people freely post copyrighted content on YouTube is the way to make more money?
I think people (me included) are so use to seeing everything on YouTube for free now that it's become an entitlement. But from time to time let's be honest with ourselves.
Posted at 10:17PM on Jun 29th 2008 by JH
9. Matthew, you missed the point. It's not that people will care what site is hosting video. It's that NBC is going to great effort to prevent people from promoting their content. Sure, Aunt Sue might care enough to track down the right website, but most of us are not going to be receiving links to YouTube videos, etc, which might make us tune in to watch on TV that evening.
NBC is working hard to reduce free publicity and exposure, which makes about as much sense as threatening to sue anyone who throws you a rope when you're drowning.
Posted at 10:20PM on Jun 29th 2008 by Brooks
10. Back in 2000, pre all video sharing sites and when only a few new about p2p sites outside of Napster, I was the first person to post "the lipton" by Vince Carter on the web. Since the game was not aired live, I capped it off the NBC local Houston morning news when they did a play of the day and posted it on a Vince Carter site that I ran. Within one day I received this 10 page email basically saying take it down or get sued for millions.
That dunk is now seen on hundreds of Vince Carter mixes on YouTube and other social networks.
So the question is when does the Olympics quit caring or give up?
Posted at 12:20AM on Jun 30th 2008 by David Astramskas
11. Ha. Ha. This should be funny when INTERNATIONAL clips start popping up on all of these sites. Maybe they should have realized the whole world has access to the internet and that NBC sure as hell ain't the only ones broadcasting the events.
Looking forward to hearing some fine Canadian, Austrailian, and South African accents (not to mention the myriad other languages) when I want to watch some Olympic clips on YouTube.
Good luck with that NBC. Seriously, you're going to need it.
Posted at 1:41AM on Jun 30th 2008 by Andrew
12. this is going to be messy.
ps love your content mark
Posted at 2:45AM on Jun 30th 2008 by simon dodson
13. Mark, NBC are going to broadcast the olympics to a relatively small percentage of the total viewing public. Who gives a rats arse about NBC? You'll have endless possibilities to post whatever the hell you want and you won't need to get it off these tossers. Giddee up!
Posted at 4:33AM on Jun 30th 2008 by Wadbo
14. I've got to agree with Andrew. NBC is not the only organization covering the Olympics, there will be more than enough ways to grab video clips people want, which will mean less and less NBC advertiser money.
I also don't understand why NBC isn't taking the same approach that they are with Hulu. Why not offer their videos to any site that wants to embed it, but have their video, their advertisements, and their distribution strategy behind it. NBC must be plagued by the big company stigma where the left hand never talks to the right hand.
15. "Given a choice of getting free promotion and getting more people excited about the Olympics"
Let me take the NBC point of view. The "free promotion" that comes from having Olympic footage available on video-sharing sites is somewhere between practically worthless and completely worthless.
There's no track record of availability on video-sharing sites doing anything to boost television ratings. Take the most famous example: the Lazy Sunday video. What happened to SNL's ratings after that video became availabvle on youtube and many other sites? Nothing. Who really got free promotion in that case, NBC/SNL or youtube?
Here's a fun game. Go into any bricks-and-mortar retail outlet, grab as much of their product as you can, leave without paying, and then pass out their stuff to people on the sidewalk for free. Then when the cops show up argue that the store should thank you for providing free promotion. Let's see how it works out!
Posted at 9:58AM on Jun 30th 2008 by Mikey
16. Mark,
I'm with you about this but have a couple comments:
"It means that if you are an Olympic athlete and you want to post video of your Gold Medal winning, world record performance on your Facebook or Myspace page, those sites may just get a takedown notice saying you dont have those rights"
I suspect this pertains to only the NBCU footage. If you record the event yourself on your own camera then they would have a tough time arguing for takedown. It is reasonable for them to argue to control footage they made. That being said, it's silly for them. They should have leading embedded video ads that run 5-10 seconds and then let these videos roam free. Encourage them to be embedded and make revenue from every CPM! How silly on their part...
Posted at 10:02AM on Jun 30th 2008 by Noah
17. 6 months ago I was predicting the Olympics wouldn't even take place. I still think it's no better then 50-50 that the we see ANY live footage AT ALL thanks to Chinese Gov't crackdowns.
Posted at 11:52AM on Jun 30th 2008 by Sporin
18. I seem to recall most sporting events (NFL, NBA, etc) have a disclaimer that says something along the lines of "this video is not to be reproduced without written concent of [insert league name here]." If you want to get really technical about it, most of those sporting events on YouTube are probably illegal. Of course they've figured out more exposure is better for them and they let it slide, the Olymipics would be stupid not to follow suit.
19. Wow, Mikey. I don't know what to say. You managed to disprove your own argument fairly effectively. Too bad you didn't notice.
Tell me again how the damage done by the YouTube distribution of the SNL clip is comparable to the damage done by the theft of tangible goods from a retail store? I want to see if you can do it again and still not see the point you're making.
Posted at 2:00PM on Jun 30th 2008 by Brooks
20. As Kris pointed out, professional leagues maintain the copyright of the events, not the broadcaster.
I'm wondering if an Olympic athlete could maintain the copyright to their performance by issuing notice to NBC prior to the games. If anything, it would make for an interesting legal battle.
Posted at 4:02PM on Jun 30th 2008 by Aaron
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1. Ah, you've got to love old media. Given a choice of getting free promotion and getting more people excited about the Olympics, or of trying to tightly control content by limiting their own audience, they'll shoot themselves every time.
It's funny that, for a company whose business model is entirely based on advertising, NBC is going out of their way to prohibit people from advertising for them -- for free.
Sure, some level of control probably makes sense. Say, "no clips longer than 2 minutes" or something. But if they are seriously going to insist that YouTube, etc, take down every bit of Olympic footage, no matter how short or in what context, it just shows how completely confused they are about their own business model. Ouch. Some companies just *want* to die, you know?
Posted at 8:22PM on Jun 29th 2008 by Brooks