Slashdot Mirror

Not sure on *live* sports in general, but you can get every NFL Game of the season from game pass for $100 which become available once the games are done. https://www.nfl.com/gamepass Much cheaper than having Cable or Satellite, but again, not live.

Yahoo is [...] reducing the availability of Yahoo TV and Yahoo Music. The company has decided instead to focus on three major parts of its business: search, communications, and digital content.

Okay, TV and Music seem to be "digital content." So they're reducing what they're focusing on?

And if they're reducing, why are they spending what I assume is a ludicrous amount of money on this?

Well, there are standards, and those standards are set out in the rules. If you look at http://static.nfl.com/static/c... you'll see that the ball has to be inflated to 12.5-13.5 psi, has to be from a specific manufacturer, and has to have specific dimensions.

There seems to be a lot of leeway as to how the ball is 'worn'. But both teams have the same leeway and the starting point is clearly defined.

So I don't think it's unreasonable. I think in any league there is some sort of an agreement as to what the standards are for equipment (whether that is equipment such as playing objects, field layout, or clothing). In baseball, for example, teams have choice as to how they build their stadiums, how high the walls are, etc etc. But the bases have to be in a specific layout. All teams are free to compete within these parameters.

Press leaks tend to be imprecise. Pretty much all of the news regarding this issue (with the exception of one NFL press statement and a press conference from the ) came from leaks.

... to help determine if a drop in temperature — a slowing of the air molecules inside the football — can explain the low pressure ....

The National Felons League (an organization of Billionaire Team Owners that is considered non-profit so that it pays no taxes) is just looking for an excuse here. The patriots were laughed at when they tried to pull the temperature excuse out of their ass, so they want a University to back up the "pressure goes down with temperature" excuse. They need to do this because even die hard Patriot fans are not buying the "a locker room attendant did this all on his own" story. And lets completely ignore why this supposed temperature drop affected only one teams footballs and not those provided by the other team, or why the problem was only observed when the opposition intercepted a ball and not by any of the Patriot players as they handled the balls.

It turns out that it's not just a locker room attendant but... an elderly locker room attendant..... Those old guys, they are always up to something nefarious....
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/...

This is the first season that any electronic device could be used by coaches and players during an NFL game. They weren't using iPads before...they were using steno pads.

You're arguing a technicality. 30 seconds of Googling turned up a 2012 article on the NFL's own website with the subheading How the iPad is revolutionizing playbooks for NFL players and coaches .

While it's true that this is the first year they're allowed on the sidelines, suggesting they weren't using iPads before is patently false and doesn't address the previous commenter's assertion that they'd be using iPads if they could. iPads have been in use in the locker room and training facilities for quite awhile, not to mention the announcers, officials, and others who have been using them during the game, both on-air and off. The iPad was announced in 2010. Between the 2011 and 2012 seasons, the league went from having two teams using iPads in place of paper playbooks to having 14 teams using them, with the prediction being that all teams would have switched to iPads by last season (I haven't found confirmation one way or the other for if it actually happened).

All of which is to say, it's a bit silly to refute a "[g]iven a choice, they'd still be using iPads" argument by suggesting that because they couldn't use them for 3 hours each week "[t]hey weren't using iPads", while failing to acknowledge that they were using them for the other 165 hours of the week.

If the likes of ESPN and the NFL make stand-alone streaming services (I believe they have the "requires cable subscription" offerings at the moment, like HBO already has) then it could be the death knell of cable subscriptions in our country

Here ya go: https://gamerewind.nfl.com/nfl...

Every single NFL game this season. Downside is you can only watch a game after it ends, but in an era of DVRs that's pretty common anyway.

Well, I can watch Rachel Maddow here. Monday Night Football requires a subscription to ESPN. If you want to watch it live you either (a) need to pay for it or (b) need to go to a bar. I'll go to a bar. It's usually more fun anyway.

If I don't care about watching it live, there's NFL Game Rewind.. $69.99 for all the games from all the teams, including playoffs and Super Bowl. If you have a favorite team, you can watch their games for $29.99, but no playoff or Super Bowl (Yeah, like your favorite team is going to make it to the Super Bowl! HA!)

Here's the proof it is known what are the angles best for knowledgeable fans to see the game. They just don't want to show them for live events. This example is for the NFL. Ask oneself, for any sport, hockey, soccer, baseball, are the angles one sees on broadcast television the ones the coaches analyze when they look at film? Of course not.

There are a few different categories of sports fans. The armchair sports fans who catch a few games while drinking a beer on the weekend are indeed not a likely target audience for this. But there are also more 'hardcore' sports fans who keep track of reams of statistics, want replays from as many angles as possible, are willing to pay for $200+ subscriptions that let them frame-by-frame step through past games, etc. There's probably a market for premium services for that segment.

When was the last time you ever had to convert yards to miles?

Sunday. Adrian Peterson finished the 2012 regular season with 1.1914772727... rushing miles

They could have the most advanced helmets in the world and it wouldn't help at all. In fact they'd probably be better off eliminating helmets and armor, because players wouldn't be able to hit each other as hard.

Look at Matt Kalil. The guy is 6'7", 306 pound, runs very fast, is very strong (30 reps bench press at 225), jumps very high. There is no way you can put people like him in a contact sport without a large risk of injury.

I think the only way football can be saved is dramatically changing the rules, or passing some sort of law exempting high schools/colleges/the NFL from injury lawsuits.

Ha, ha. No. I promise you it's not just about actual counterfeits. I know precious little about American football (and I have no intention of learning more), but one thing that is apparent is that the NFL, moreso than any of the other national sports leagues, is obsessive about controlling anything that might be linked to a team. If you want to show that you're a fan, either you made your memorabilia yourself, or you bought it from an approved vendor; there is nothing in between. No vague cultural links are permitted. It's like Righthaven, only without the whole "hilariously tragic disbarment forever" part, because they have money and cultural clout, and Righthaven did not.

It's not a waste of time, it's an IP-related evil comparable to the MAFIAA.

" Do you have any tips for stopping cable for people who live with fans of cable news or cable sports?"

Yes: kill them. Tell them all they need is /. If they don't understand get new fans, they're not worth having around anyway.

Only news I get is online (/.) or Colbert. Seriously news is waaay overrated. Haven't watched the local news in 4 years and I don't feel worse for wear.

But if someone must have sports *shutters* then there's NFL Game Rewind with every NFL game in HD, NHL GameCenter Live for live NHL games and MLB. There's also ESPN, ESPN3, Fox Soccer... just google it, and they all work with PlayON which is compatible with PS3 and Xbox360.

I take great pride in hating Zurich Financial ala Farmers Insurance (farmersreallysucks.com) because they're assholes.

Now if you mean strictly hating something incapable of harming you if you watch it (like football,football, or rugby), then yeah I agree with you.

If it wasn't for sports, I'd consider canceling cable/sattelite and just watching content via the internet.

What sports are you trying to watch? heard of http://mlb.tv?
https://mdl.mlssoccer.com/mlsmdl/secure
/registerform
http://nfl.com/live
http://www.nhl.com/gamecenter/
http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/hockeynight
http://justin.tv/
http://atdhe.net/

The NFL Saints can trademark a specific design - like gold, with black and white borders but they can't trademark the fleur-de-lis itself. They also can't trademark this design if its already in common use.

you never actually buy anything with DRM, you simply rent it.

I've never heard it put this way before, and it's a wonderful point.

And it also frames my purchasing behavior in a way that makes a lot of sense. Specifically, I have no problem whatsoever paying for DRM stuff, if it's offered at a steeply discounted price that makes one-time use attractive.

I would never buy DRM music from iTunes, or for that matter even pay for non-DRM music in Apple's proprietary codecs, because if I'm paying money for music I want to feel like I own it for life.

Even if DRM technically gives me lifetime access to a given product, I assume I'm going to lose the key, or the company running the DRM valdiation server will go out of business.

That's why, like iTunes music, Kindle doesn't make any sense to me. I assume at some point, whether in five years or twenty, I'm going to get locked out of all the books I supposedly own --- if for no other reason than I'm likely to switch to a different eBook reader five or twenty years from now that's not Kindle compatible. Given that I don't feel like Kindle truly offers permanent ownership, I think its prices aren't nearly discounted enough to be attractive.

The best book I've read lately is _Eating Animals_ which Amazon currently sells for $14.90. This for a hardcover book printed on acid-free paper. It'll last the rest of my life and then some, so the only way I lose ownership is if I decide to give it away. The Kindle version,by contrast, is $11.92 --- barely a $3 discount. Given the DRM and the device lock-in, that's ridiculously expensive compared to the hardcover.

What would make infinitely more sense is if I could *rent* the book on Kindle for, say, $3 or $4 --- for a six month period. As dstar said in the parent post, "you never actually buy anything with DRM, you simply rent it."

And to me, there's nothing at all wrong with that --- if things are priced accordingly, and even with DRM expiration dates. Where things become morally suspect is when a DRM item is sold under the pretense that the buyer has gained lifetime ownership. It just ain't true.

Returning to the Slashdot story on Lulu, I've got no problem at all with Lulu deciding to offer DRM books. But I think they should be offered in such a way that it's clear that readers are renting them for one-time use, not buying them for a lifetime --- and they should be priced accordingly. If these terms are explicit and DRM is part of the deal, I don't have any problem with that. Just like I don't have any problem with the fact that I currently rent my access both to NFL Game Rewind and to NetFlix's "Watch Instantly" feature. There's DRM in both these products, but there are no false pretenses that the reasonable price I'm paying is buying me lifetime access to what I see.

In the case of NFL Replay and Netflix's "Watch Instantly," I'm getting one-time access to stuff I very much want to see but don't want to own, at a very fair price. DRM makes this sort of deal attractive and workable to both me and to the rights holders, and I think that's great. I don't think DRM's the devil at all. In fact, I'd like to see more products wrapped in DRM and available at a steep discount for one-time use. The world would be a better place for rights holders and consumers alike.

You mean like this?

20 out of the top 21 leading point makers of the regular 2007 season are kickers. Guess how they put points on the board.....yeah, they kick the ball. NFL Scoring Stats

However, the combined cumulative effects of incestuous polygamy and living downwind from Dugway Proving Ground are beginning to exhibit themselves with a vengeance.

Aren't there already laws against unfair use of someone else's trademark? It strikes me that what this law may end up doing is making it illegal to say "My patented widget will turn your XBOX into a 100% effective chick magnet", even if that statement is 100% factual. There's got to be some existing legal argument why advertisers all over Known Space are not allowed to place the word "super" next to the word "bowl", even if the use of those two words is not even remotely infringing.

1. A bunch of players maneuvering a ball around a field measured with the metric system? Meterball.

2. A bunch of players maneuvering a ball around a field measured with the 'english' system? Football

Since neither of the sports uses just one foot, shouldn't it be feetball?

FYI: the NFL takes steroids very seriously and tests with great rigor. Not to be confused with there testing of recreation drugs, which they treat as a medical problem. The policy makes sense when you consider it's about maintaing a balance of competitive edges.

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/6744864

I would be surprised if any professional soccer league in world was a strigent about "'roids" as the NFL is.

People are people. If there are people that play football that would take "'roids" then there are people whio play soccer who would take it. The question then becomes "What does the league do to curb it's use?"

on the funny side, while looking up some information, I cvame accross this tidbit:

http://www.athleticscholarships.net/history-of-soc cer.htm

"that took place in the united States was watched by an estimated 33 billion people around the world for almost 27 days. "

33 billion? heh.

Also, at one point it was outlawed in England.

It's a silly debate because Rugby, Football(soccer) and football(football) all go back to the same sport.

If you want to get pendantic, then soccer should be called 'Mob Ball' as it was in Britain at one time. Especially since soccer is a direct descendant of 'Mob Ball'

There is a correlation. Whether or not it is causal or coincident is unknown, but it is meaningful. You're upset because it either conflicts with your political beliefs or because it is personally embarassing.

Don't pick on the hot chicks, they're not stupid either... and putting down others won't raise you up. Slagging good looking women is no more than parroting another stereotype. Here are some counter examples: Cindy Crawford was a high-school valedictorian and studied Chemical Engineering at Northwestern University (on an academic scholaship) before she made it big as a model. Hedy Lamarr (major hottie back in grampa's day) invented and patented spread spectrum radio. Sharon Stone's IQ is estimated to be 154, while Madonna's is estimated at 140 and Nicole Kidman's is "only" 134. Finally, this former NFL cheerleader is a mensa member.

TMQ had it first!

In fact, a quick Google search throws up a long list of articles from TNR, The Atlantic, and Slate.com, etc., following a similar theme. This guy has been chipping away on this line for a long time now...

Also writes a weekly column on NFL football during the season.

He needs to quite writing these useless articles and get back to the important stuff.

Why are you punting???

Unfortunately I can't find a good link to the article I originally read, but it's listed as #96 of the 101 dumbest moments in business (2005).

Actually, from what I've seen, this year they are doing just that. They've schedule Fox Overtime or some such nonsense where the ex-jocks yammer about the day's games at 7:00PM Eastern. So if a game goes longer than 30 minutes over (which is tricky to do unless it goes into overtime), the ex-jocks get less time.

As for cutting out the football game, sorry. I'd rather see the end of the game in most cases. I was visiting my parents in Vermont several years ago (before they got DirecTV). CBS had stopped covering the NFL, but the local CBS-affiliate, WCAX, had gotten permission to run the NFL games because there was no Fox affiliate in the area. They still had to run the CBS programming at the scheduled time. It rather sucked when there was 1:50 left and the Pats were driving downfield to win the game. Tom Brady throws a pass and--tick tick tick tick "Welcome to 60 minutes."

Besides, anybody else remember "The Heidi Game"? They can't afford to going buying new switchboards every week... :^)

There already is a football channel that never shows entire football games. It's called NFL Network. Almost all its programming is highlights and recaps of NFL games. I don't think it ever shows current regular-season NFL games as the league sold the TV rights to ABC/CBS/ESPN/Fox/(NBC next year).

Heidi?

I was actually shocked this week when Fox managed to show all of it's Sunday night programming despite the President's address.

If only my TiVo were smart enough to handle this... now I must wait for the repeat on Cartoon Network.

I will have enought money to finish building my "real" woman.

I run this "real" site, and dumb men give me money.
http://www.moneyslave.fetishfantasygirl.com/
Well, not really, but I could do something like that.

Just like the dumb men that give money to the ppl here.
http://www.playboy.com/

or here.
http://www.nfl.com/
http://www.nba.com/
http://www.mlb.com/
http://www.nhl.com/

Yah, I said Christmas. Not Happy Holidays.

"for being so concerned w/ names you should have checked your spelling. The correct spellings are: Lavernius and Jevon"

I was very careful with my spelling. Here's the info from NFL.com.

http://www.nfl.com/players/playerpage/187742

http://scout.scout.com/a.z?s=183&p=8&c=1&nid=18844 29&refid=1

If you think I'm still in error, could you please show that these folks I just mentioned don't have the names as I described?

Thanks in advance.

Mug shot here.

If you like obscure trivia, rants about bad science in movies, reader haiku, and weekly complaints of inconsistencies in the Star Trek universe mixed in with your football, then Tuesday Morning Quarterback is the football column that every good football loving slashdotter should read.

Or, maybe I'm just singing the praises of his column because I like it that he printed my haiku pointing out that the temperature of space is not actually absolute zero (how many football columns would even get on to that subject in the first place?).

If you like obscure trivia, rants about bad science in movies, reader haiku, and weekly complaints of inconsistencies in the Star Trek universe mixed in with your football, then Tuesday Morning Quarterback is the football column that every good football loving slashdotter should read.

Or, maybe I'm just singing the praises of his column because I like it that he printed my haiku pointing out that the temperature of space is not actually absolute zero (how many football columns would even get on to that subject in the first place?).

Umpire -- Primary responsibility to rule on players' equipment, as well as their conduct and actions on scrimmage line.

Trust me, if someone like EA Sports were to take this on, at least the US leagues (and probably the players' unions as well) would be lining up to issue licenses and collect $$$$ (and I doubt that FIFA and the other European leagues would be far behind).

AND, if the players' unions got in on it, then the game players could pretend to be the actual players, and get to use their stats and names ("I get to be David Beckham!" "I get to be Ted Washington, and you're unconscious now!")

That's funny, because the NFL lists last year's records under the "2003" season. So what happened to the 2004 season, if this is the 2005 season?

Wow, I didn't know that Ricky Williams posted on /.!

Atheism has about as many variants as Christianity... probabally more.

Perhaps I could use a term a little more appropriate, like Secular-Humanism, which is much more specific in terms of theological viewpoint than simply the concept of somebody who rejects diety or any other sort of supernaturalism. These do indeed have organizations, even aspects that could be called in other context a "sacrament".

Some atheists I've seen go so far as to form "clubs" of common social groups of this particular viewpoint, mainly to take advantage of the social aspects of an organized religion without the theological overtones. Sometimes this is just for a beer and a round of Poker, but even these can take varied forms. If you've never heard about this before, then you are sheltered.

BTW, I did see a survey of Unitarian ministers that claimed over 65% of the ministers didn't believe in the existance of a God.

Although the U.S.S.R. was officially "atheist", it did indeed have a pantheon of "heros" that were "sacred", and if you ever went to visit Lenin's Tomb it was as much of a religious experience as any I've ever heard about or seen. I had a close friend who brought a camera into there (Lenin's tomb) pre-falling of the Berlin Wall, and he got a very interesting tour of Moscow in the back of a KGB car for over six hours. The only reason he came home was because he was the son of an American politican and they didn't want to turn it into an international incident.

BTW, you wanted me to point to at least "one religion that does not rely on supernatural mechanism for its existance". It can be argued that worship of the GNU/Linux gods can be a cult, but (un)fortunately most of the gods of that religious movement are still alive and able to tell you you are out of your mind to deal with the Church of Emacs as anything but a joke. It does fit the definition you were talking about, however.

You can also say that watching "Monday Night Football" can also be a religous experience for some people, with regular meeting times and requisite sacramental offerings. What I think of people that worship John Madden is another story.

He wan't censored. He was able to say what he wanted and he was then fired for what he said. Many people can and do get fired for saying the wrong things on the job. Especially if it is against guy like Donovan McNabb who plays a lot of good football which gets people to watch your highlight/fake news show. And in the end the sports journalists loved the whole event because they had something to talk about for a week. Plus he has his own radio show to vent on.

2) Trent Lott, US Senate/US mainstream media;

Again, he was able to say what he wanted. Boo-F-ing Hoo that America does not value his words like John Stewart's

3) Dr. Laura Schlessinger, gay-right groups;

This was not censorship. This was people using economic pressure to remove someone from the air that was not liked enough to produce such a sentiment. If you believe that removal of a product (even media) by boycott is censorship, I would hate to hear what you think about labor unions.

4) Conservative faulty & speakers, every college campus;

Um, come to Texas bub!

5) Bernard Goldberg, banned from network interviews while promoting NYT bestseller. 6) Ann Coulter, banned from network interviews while promoting NYT bestseller. 7) Sean Hannity, banned from network interviews while promoting NYT bestseller.

Hmmm. I think they all got plenty of air time on Fox News. That's why the network exists. And cry me a river for these people who lack media exposure but are on the bestseller list!

Wrong...

Actually...
NFL Chronology 1869-1910
Wanders off whistling, hands in pockets

This is the reason I will choose Sirius. You get all the NFL games broadcast. Kinda like Sunday Ticket for radio.

Sirius will be carrying all regular- and post-season NFL games next season. They also carry many NHL and NBA games.

The downside to the current NBA and NHL coverage is that you only get one team's radio broadcast, unlike NHL's on-line broadcast where you can choose which broadcast you want (and if you'd like the French broadcast for Montreal or Ottawa)

Apparently, even in Canada's biggest market, Canadians aren't any more sophisticated than Americans.

For example, a number of years back, the local CFL franchise Toronto Argonauts were having a great season, averaging 39 points a game! On offense, not total game score! Come September, the run to the playoffs is on, and they draw something like 20000 fans to a game, maybe less, I don't recall. That same weekend, an NFL pre-season exhibition game also in Toronto drew 55000 people! Buloads of Torontonians regular travel down to Buffalo Bills games.

Toronto doesn't dislike Canadian music on it's merits, only because it's not American.

Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Hatch is trying to pull this off at the same time Congress is debating whether the BCS violates antitrust laws. The NCAA doesn't have an antitrust exemption, and neither does the NFL. To my knowledge, Major League Baseball is the only group of that sort to have an antitrust exemption, and even that's come up for debate during all those strikes.

A simple public awareness campaign should put an end to the madness. In the context of other "market realities," it simply doesn't make sense. In fact, Congress has taken an active interest in limiting those other "market realities." Seriously, what's the difference between one group controlling all access to recorded music and one group controlling all access to pro football?

Madden years run ahead 1 year of the actual NFL season. What madden is calling "Madden 2004" is actually for the 2003 season. The person who wrote this article has the years mixed up.

Madden 2001 which was released at the start of the 2000 season a season in which the Titans went to the playoffs and lost the ravens. Eddie George who was on the cover that year had an impressive season...He rushed for 1509 yards and 14 TD's and had an additional 453 yards recieving and 2 TDs.

So overall he had 1962 yards and 16 tds. Very Impressive. He got injured the season AFTER that.

Madden 2002 which was released at the start of the 2001 season had Daunte Culpepper on the cover. In 2001 Culpepper was injured for a short while, but still managed to pass for 2612 yards and 14 TD's. He also rushed for 416 yards and 5 TD's. So overall he had 3028 yards and 19 TD's. While those aren't pro bowl numbers they aren't too shabby. What is impressive is, he had those numbers in playing only 11 games instead of 16.

Madden 2003 which was released at the start of the 2002 season had Marshall Faulk on the cover. In 2002, like Daunte Faulk was injured, although not badly enough to slow his productivity in the games he started. In only 10 Starts Marshall had 1490 all purpose yards and 10 TD's. While that is a down year for Marshall that is impressive for any other RB.

Now, Madden 2004 has Mike Vick on the cover who got hurt in preseason and will miss 4 regular season games. The games he will miss are at Dallas, Washington, Tampa bay, and at Carolina. The Falcons will likely go 3-1 without him, 2-2 if they blow the game to Carolina.

All in all, The Madden Curse didn't apply to Eddie George (he had a good year that year) and Culpepper and Faulk had off years due to minor injuries but their off years were as good as some players who weren't injured. We can't Judge Vick yet.

I wouldn't call it a curse just yet, now the guys who were on the covers of those old Sega Gensis sports games were cursed.