Slashdot Mirror
No Social Media In These College Stadiums
RawJoe writes "Today, the Southeastern Conference (SEC) is expected to release a final version of its new media policy that, at the moment, can best be described as a ban on all social media usage at SEC games. Earlier this month, the conference informed its schools of the new policy, which says that ticketed fans can't 'produce or disseminate (or aid in producing or disseminating) any material or information about the Event, including, but not limited to, any account, description, picture, video, audio, reproduction or other information concerning the Event.' Translated, that means no Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, TwitPic, or any other service that could in any way compete with authorized media coverage of the event. In the case of the SEC, authorized media coverage rights belong to CBS, who has a $3B deal with the conference over the next 15 years, according to The St Petersburg Times." Good luck with that. To quote Clay Shirky, "The idea that people can't capture their own lived experience is a losing proposition."
As long as everybody at the game just goes ahead and Tweets, it'll be OK. There's no way that the SEC can control thousands of people doing this at will. It will illustrate the ridiculousness of the whole policy.
Using Twitter and Facebook when you're at a game is distracting at best, narcissistic at worst. However, the assumption that they are using to fuel their ban - that personal accounts and expressions are somehow not admissible, that CBS has a monopoly on communication - is dangerous, and should be protested. You can laugh it off and say, "There's no way that this is Constitutional," but you should stand up for your rights. As lame as it may sound, they should organize a huge Twitter contingent to post at the same time, and see if they can get kicked out. That would show people how out of touch the SEC is, and that people's rights cannot be signed away, with OR without their consent.
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
Wow, what idiot decided to do that? Signing away broadcast rights for 15 years for a measly 3 billion? That's 200 million a year, that really is not that much money.
Who knows what kind of tech we will get in those 15 years? It's going to be very difficult to control that over the long term.
Since schools are disseminators of knowledge, this policy to ban knowledge/information attacks the entire institution of education. What network TV has to do with the educational process beyond Cable In The Classroom is beyond understanding. Clearly these policies will need to change or colleges will no longer be an effective means of higher education.
I WAS an SEC football fan. I'm not whether I'm allowed to be now. Can I not discuss the game with friends the next day now? Fuck that.
If you open your mind too wide, people will throw trash in it.
Whoever keeps making these rules really doesn't get it I guess. Making rules, valid legally or not, that fly in the face of what people almost unconsciously expect just erodes the respect of legitimate law. So thanks a lot for further degrading respect for rules of any kind.
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started