Slashdot Mirror
Will Your Super Bowl Party Anger the Copyright Gods?
garg0yle writes "According to some folks, watching the Super Bowl on a television bigger than 55 inches is illegal. Is this true? Yes and no — long story short, if you're in a private residence you're probably okay, but if you're running a sports bar you may technically have to negotiate a license with the NFL. Just don't charge for food, or call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright."
We talked about this two years ago. Copyright still sucks, nothing new here.
P.S.: Amazingly, that was on February, 2nd 2008. I wonder if we will be talking about Yahoo considering an alliance with Google tomorrow!
If you can't mod them join them.
They are being idiots, please restore some sanity.
Shh.
so being in New Orleans, I'll have a "Who Dat" Party ... oh wait... "© Dat" Party.
http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2010/01/vitter_to_nfl_back_of_who_dat.html
...call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright.
Summary fail. Perhaps you mean trademark?
I hope so.
Just don't charge for food, or call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright.
You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means.
Just don't charge for food, or call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright."
I'd like to hear a lawyer stand up and say that with a straight face. Trademarked? Possibly. Copyright? Not likely. And even it was a registered mark, I fail to see what food has to do with anything, or how it would be actionable unless the rightsholder is organising similar events that might be confused with whatever private viewing we're talking about here.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
This is news for nerds, remember?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Can I call it a Superb Owl party?
In theory, practice and theory are the same. In practice, they're not.
We won't be watching. On any TV.
I'm not going to RTFA if the submitter can't even tell the difference between copyright and trademark -- in this case, of 'Super Bowl' -- after reading the article.
And we will have fruit in BIG BOWLS!
(text is in subject line)
Just turn the sound off.
You have to love and clauses that allow one simple variance to void the whole thing.
Is BYOB charging for food?
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/gameon/post/2010/02/halftime-who-dat-whos-greedy-the-nfl/1
You missed the one important part, anywhere there is money involved there will be claims. The NFL is claiming ownership of a fan derived saying, let alone one where most of it has been part of the dialect
Never under estimate money, lawyers, and stupidity, combined.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Indeed. It isn't first time that /. submitters and editors have made that mistake. Or the second. Or the third... In fact, I am pretty sure that ScuttleMonkey has done this before, several times.
On one hand, I am inclined to think that this is editors' inside joke. You know, repeating that error and watching how many people begin complaining about that isntead of discussing the subject. On the other hand, /. summaries concerning intellectual property are hilariously wrong more often than not (Especially when it comes to patents. As a rule of thumb, the thing being patented is certainly not what /. summary claims it to be, which is just a summary of someone's misinterpration of the abstract) so I can't tell for sure.
Face it, the NFL are brilliant. They are not about football. They are about revenue. They had two goals in mind when setting out on their broadcasting endeavor:
a) Sell high-cost adspace
b) Get people to care about the adspace
Now you hear people always saying "I watch the superbowl for the commercials!" Mission A-Ccomplished NFL. Was that enough? It's never enough. So the last 10 years have been their attempt to make more money by becoming some of the biggest douchebags in the IP industry.
"That's the thing about greed, Arch, it's blind. And it doesn't know when to stop" -- Lenny Cole
I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
Bring Your Own Super Bowl License.
The screen will be 9 ft diagonal. So technically, yes we will be in violation. Oh well. I don't feel too bad. I'm not losing any sleep. Its an unenforceable stupid, greedy rule.
While this is really moot in the home, its funny how they pretty much make it wrong to watch the Superbowl in 6.1, 7.1 or 9.1 home theater systems.
You see, I'm having a party where I'll be serving soup.
It will be served in my wife's favorite dishware.
And my son will be serving it when I tell him to.
It will start during the daylight hours.
So I told all my friends to come over for a "Soup her bowl, Son - Day Party".
Life, the Universe, and Everything... in my image.
Watching television may become illegal completely some day. Is that a bad thing?
That's debatable.
From the summary:
The article directly contradicts both of those claims.
It's one thing to comment without RTFA, but to submit without RTFA takes a special kind of stupid.
This is madness. Someone is going to have stop this, or it is going to mean the end of TV.
This is why you should use a projector on a moveable screen, mark the 54" spot on the floor, and then allow some douche to move the screen to the 150" mark so you can claim plausible deniability.
to http://www.slashdot.org/SuperBowl44.tor
Fuck The DMCA AND the NFL.
Yours In Rostov-On-Don,
K. Trout
...my Super Bowl party is going to involve games of Chez Geek, Hero Quest, and a Civ 4 LAN.
Anything remotely related to Football is banned.
Living With a Nerd
Who dat screwing with my big TV?
Just don't...call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright.
The term is not copyrighted. The term is trademarked.
The trademark status has advantages and disadvantages. Since it's been registered and in use for at least 5 years (since 1969 in fact), the trademark is much harder to invalidate, per 15 USC 1065. Unlike copyrights, trademarks really do last forever, given proper maintenance (yes, I realize that copyrights practically last forever too, but there are trademarks that are centuries old).
Some of the disadvantages of a trademark are that the remedies are weaker (no statutory damages) and the trademark holder must police the mark. You can't license it to just anybody. You have to maintain some control over the licensed good or service, typically in the form of quality standards. You also have to go after potential infringers. Failure to do so can lead to losing the mark.
It's that last requirement that is driving the NFL's actions here (well, that and the money to be made). Whether the law in fact requires them to be as strict about it as they are is another question, one that very few people on Slashdot are really competent to answer. Whether the law should require them to be so strict, however, is a different question and one that most of us probably agree on the answer to.
As a side note, footage of individual games is copyrighted. The NFL argues that footage of the game is licensed only for private viewing and not for commercial viewing, which is how they go after sports bars and the like. I would argue that if you put your game on the public airwaves, it should be fair game for live viewing. If they want to enter into a more restrictive license with the viewer they should put the game on pay per view, a premium channel, or a cable channel at the very least.
Who cares about Super Bowl, it is no longer the single most watched sports event :)
http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/3280912/Champions-League-final-tops-Super-Bowl-in-TV
"Will Your Super Bowl Party Anger the Copyright Gods?" They're hardly gods; a more precise term would be "demons" or "devils".
The bar I go to has two TVs, if they show it on the big one they'll be in violation. TFA doesn't say what happens if you give food away, as the one mentioned will (regular readers of my journal will know the name of the bar). If I remember correctly, Sanmy's Sports Bar downtown doesn't have any screens smaller than 55 inches. It seems ironic that a sports bar can't show sports! And every bar I know of sells pizza; I think Sammy's has a kitchen.
Also, how can you copyright the term "super bowl?" Is someone confusing copyright with trademark?
Free Martian Whores!
you need a license from the NFL to call it the Super Bowl. If you haven't noticed most of the TV commercials call it The Big Game because they don't want to pay royalties to the NFL
since /. takes advertising i'm going to report this evil website so the NFL can sue you out of existance. you just cost them eleventy billion $$$$ in lost sales
A church advertised a Super Bowl party, in which they weren't charging a dime to attend. It didn't stop the NFL lawyers from descending.
All major leagues also have the statement that not only can you not rebroadcast, but you can't disseminate or report on the game without their written, express consent.
You apparently don't have the right to talk about the game. Way to be fan-friendly.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
This is getting even closer to the UFC's pay-per-view model of TV. In order for bars to show these events they have to pay thousands of dollars, and in order to make it worth it they'd have to black their windows (to stop people just watching from the street) and charge everyone cover to get in. I don't think the super bowl organizers really want this because of the negative impact on ad viewership. Fact is bars are already paying for the content and for the super bowl they want to double dip for some bonus money without making it pay-per-view, which isn't really fair.
Q.E.D.
until a NFL lawyer goes crazy and starts suing people with 60"+ TVs in their room, its the best thing that could possibly happen. A nation wide freak out by "Joe the Plumber" would most likely force congress to make needed changes a broken law.
All your owls are belong to us.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Yes, and I don't give a rat's ass. Satisfied?
Honestly, who gives a shit? The simple solution is stop supporting some industry that will try to sue you for being a patron.
"Growing old is inevitable; growing up is optional."
Yes well, I found a feather from a Great Snowy Owl
in my Canadian back yard, so invited some friends
over to look at it.
email subject:
"Superb owl part, eh!"
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
It's not as popular, but it's more magical.
Don't they make their money off commercials? Why should someone have to pay for having people over to watch those commercials? I think sports bars are much less likely to change channels during commercials to catch 3 minutes of Family Guy, so their advertisements will be more effective than in many private homes.
I think a reasonable arrangement would be if you had to report it to the NFL, saying "I'll be having an NFL party in a bar that can have 80 people inside", so the NFL can use those numbers to get more money from their advertisers. If anything, they should be paying YOU.
I'd rather you rationally disagree than irrationally agree.
Will Your Super Bowl Party Anger the Copyright Gods?
No gods. Just little men in suits trying to justify their petty, venal little existences as leeches on civilization's bum.
As for sports bars, they're a business encouraging a large number of willing viewers to watch someone else's advertising revenue supported content. Of course they should be compensated.
There. Fixed that for ya.
"It was also totally my fault that the NFL broadcasted in Hi Def for some strange reason."
garg0yle writes "...Just don't charge for food, or call it a 'Super Bowl' party, ...."
So perhaps the thing to do is call it a "Supper Bowl" party, and thus cover the food.
In much the same way the aliens in War of the Worlds were destroyed by simple micro-organisms they were ill equipt to deal with, the Superbowl has a simple yet fatal weakness when it comes to the common human nipple. If the NFL gives you any guff about your party just lift your shirt and flash your nipples in a manner similar to the Care Bear Stare until they flee in terror.
If you didn't come to party don't bother knocking on my door. Prince '1999'
Sometimes it seems as though common sense is incompatible with capitalism.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
And still record all the games just because I'm doing it without the express written consent of Major League Baseball. I'll have to add the NFL to the roster. I just imagine every time the tapes spin while a game's on the lawyers hiss and fume in their cages.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
for this has nothing to do with government, or bureaucracy. they both are empty machinery that works according to the wishes of the people manning them and how the gears set up.
and in america, those who set up its gears and man its operators are corporations. they buy the laws they need with the monetary power they have, and the thing just runs according to that.
the tag should have been corporatism, instead of idiocracy. for, it is corporatism that allows minority to trample majority's rights in our age's democracies.
Read radical news here
No, not the Dirty Jobs guy, the one who got MikeRoweSoft.com taken away from him.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
The Onion's already gone there and underscored that silliness is not the only thing which hardcore nerds and jocks have in common.
I couldn't care less about the Superbowl. Generally, the only part that's worth watching is the commercials... and you can watch them online now.
âoeAny society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.
I don't care what kind of football-playing super engineers Rice University can churn out, they're never gonna make the Super Bowl.
So that it's not entirely random: their stadium hosted Super Bowl 8. Where the Vikings lost per usual.
Bars and taverns have been living with performance rights since the nickelodeon days.
Way back then, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes summed it up this way: "If music did not pay, it would be given up. Whether it pays or not, the purpose of employing it is profit and that is enough."
The fund raiser is a headache in its own right - most people will take the trademarked logo or slogan as proof of corporate sponsorship or endorsement of the event - and when the organizers blow the proceeds on a trip to Vegas, their victims will be out looking for someone to blame.
How absurd, selfish, and blind are these people?
NFL Fan: "Hey, Joe's Pub has a 60" TV, and they're going to have the Big Game on. Sweet! Ten friends and I are gonna have a great time there!"
NFL Management: "Alert! Fans watching our games in public without our express written consent. We've clearly just lost MILLIONS in revenue because of this. If only our viewers understood the logic of... uh, ummm, ah... Hey, why DO we prohibit this? It brings people together to enjoy our product, stimulates the economy by bringing patrons to bars and casual dining restaurants, and generally helps promote what we do without costing us anything in advertising expenses."
NFL Lawyer: "So I can have a job."
For conscience is the wound, and there's naught to staunch it
The difference is that jocks memorize that crap, while many nerds have photographic memories. Those guys in the Onion article know all that stuff about Alien Nation because they have no choice; once they've seen an episode, they know the dialog by heart.
Free Martian Whores!
Your Heading for this article is a copyright infringement, and so is each time ./ poters refers to it!
As for sports bars, they're a business mooching off someone else's content. Of course they should pay.
They're already paying. They have higher cable/satellite bills than home subscribers.
Free Martian Whores!
The Champions League football final is now the most watched annual sports even in the world (109M last year compared to 106M for the Super Bowl). Maybe this means you will soon be able watch something more exciting whilst waiting for those much hyped half-time adverts?
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
I suppose I could drag myself to a friends house to watch an unsually large number of overweight black males and a few healthy black males in an American sporting event which for some reason is 3/4th black but over half of the quarterbacks are white and most of the team owners are white.
With few asians and very few hispanics I just find it hard to sit and start at a screen of fat black men lead by white quarterbacks as they run up and down a 100 yard field for no apparent reason other then the spectators amusement. I might as well watch fat people fight over a donut, it's just as absurd but substantally more entertaining. Especially if it were to the death.
But seriosuly does no one see the parelells here? You might as well call it the cotton bowl with the QB as Taskmaster and the team owners... oh wait....
Given that description does anything the NFL does make sense? Seriously how can you have so many black guys playing and so few of them quarterbacks? It's insulting. The NFL has been ass backwards for decades and I am sure decades to come...
So mod FLAMEBAIT, FUNNY, OFFTOPIC, or just plain sad....?
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
I'll let you call me son if I get to soup your wife's bowl at the party.
I think I ruptured my spleen from laughing so hard!
[rant]
Instead of passively witnessing multimillionaire drug addicts chase a ball to sell ad space... do something. Take the people who were going to show up for "da big game" outside to play tag football. Have a foosball championship. Play card games. Have a LAN party. Play DnD. Do something.
The outcome of the game will be the same whether you watch it or not.
Whatever teams are playing this year are branches of a company. Do you care which 7-11 sold the most hotdogs? Or if the Pepsi bottling plant on the east coast produced more soda than the west coast plant? Even if it is your home team, the players aren't from your town. They're employees shuffled around or chasing contracts. At least the local high school games have some attachment to you.
Go ahead and mod me troll or flambait if i've hurt your feelings and doing something to me will make you feel better about how you've spent your Sundays. Just take a moment to consider *doing* something instead of watching others. And if the team you cheered for won... don't say "we won". If you didn't leave a drop of blood or sweat on the field... you were not a part of that victory. You're a witness, that's it. Watching something someone else did is not an accomplishment and no reason to be proud. The team won. You watched.
[/rant]
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
These things end the same every time and rarely have any kind of interesting twist.
In fact, they're composed of smaller units which are similar to the larger. This Menger Sponge of entertainment can claim an average of only 17 minutes of actual action in an event that ostensibly takes one hour yet occupies an entire afternoon to stage.
It's the ultimate in mass-produced manufactured entertainment. I can't understand why it's still so popular.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
As for sports bars, they're a business encouraging a large number of willing viewers to watch someone else's advertising revenue supported content. Of course they should be compensated.
There. Fixed that for ya.
No, you didn't. Trademark (and any economic right) is not contingent upon what you judge will be beneficial for the holder of the trademark even if your judgment is the best possible one given the empirical evidence. So the argument "but it's good for them", no matter how true, is simply inapt -- it is not the right criterion on which to judge the legality of the action.
For instance, the term "Linux" is trademarked to the Linux foundation, meaning I cannot use it commercially to designate my product unless that foundation appropriately sub-licenses it (see, e.g. http://www.linuxmark.org/faq.php). I cannot call my product WrathLinux and sell it for a profit without a license, irrespective of any arguments, true or otherwise, about whether the distribution of this product is "good" for Linux or not. The same goes for copyrights. I may not violate the GPL in redistributing WrathLinux irrespective of arguments that doing so is beneficial for Linux.
Instead, I must convince the proper rights holder that what I'm doing really is to their benefit, in which case that can grant me a license (in the case of the GPL this is practically impossible but dual-licensing of some software is seen). That is, the rights holder has the final say about whether that behavior is actually beneficial.
In the Super Bowl case, it's evident the NFL does not consider this beneficial. Whether or not that is wise, that is properly their decision to make. Arguments that they are deciding poorly are not equivalent to arguments that they do not have the right to make the decision.
There will be a 60" Vizio plasma, a XVGA 3-M projector TV with a 3M screen, 5.1 surround off the Onkyo, and plenty of food.
*** I WILL BE CHARGING *** But only to watch the game. The burgers, brats, dogs, and fixin's are all free.
Some details:
The burgers will be Coleman natural.
The brats will be Emerill.
The dogs will be Hebrew National 100% beef.
THERE WILL BE BEER (Free, as in FREE BEER) and WINE and SCOTCH (single-malt only).
Right now I'm thinking Heineken mini-kegs, but this could change if the weather allows large chest of microbrews.
Attendance to anyone 21 years of age or older is open with ticket. Tickets buy you the right to view The SuperBowl in my house.
E
P.S. Authorized legal representatives of the NFL can contact my attorney. Martindale Hubbell 60189.
I thought I'd never figure out what this thread was about.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Bowl
or call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright.
No it isn't. It's trademarked. Different thing.
Americans spent $200 billion on sports merchandise, while the National Cancer Institute research budget is only $5 billion. How about we all turn off the Super Bowl (tm) and get a life.
I liked the first version better...
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
The first rule of the Super Bowl*: You do not talk about the Super Bowl
*Super Bowl is a registered trademark of the National Football League and is used here solely for academic and satirical purposes. The use of the term 'Super Bowl' in no way constitutes an attempt by me to misrepresent it as the property of any entity but the National Football League. Your mileage may vary. Void where prohibited. Must be 18 years of age or older to play. Offer not vaild outside the United States and it's territorial holdings. If redness or itching develop, discontinue use and consult a Physician. Aim away from face when opening. Objects in this mirror are closer than they appear. Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
So the argument "but it's good for them", no matter how true, is simply inapt -- it is not the right criterion on which to judge the legality of the action.
Did he say anything about the legality of it? He said that the sports bar owners should be compensated (yes, he actually put the words in your mouth, but that's beside the point) for encouraging lots of people to watch ad-supported content. Everything you say about that not actually being the case is true, but is orthogonal to his point that it should be.
I'm not saying I agree with him. I'm just saying that you missed his point.
Arguments that they are deciding poorly are not equivalent to arguments that they do not have the right to make the decision.
He didn't say that they do not have that right. He either said they ought not to have that right or that they ought not to exercise it, depending on how you interpret what he wrote.
So what your saying is...I could not write a book and title it "The Blank guide to blanking for Linux" without asking for permission? That doesn't sound right to me. As for copyright issues. As the games are BROADCASTED to the PUBLIC open and free, doesn't that make any copyright null and void?
After that great 2004 half time show, there's really nothing about it worth watching anymore.
Have gnu, will travel.
I just don't get the appeal of American football... Everyone lines up, crashes into each other, play stops. Then they line up again, and crash again, and play stops again. Repeat over and over.
I bet if I edited all the stops out of a recorded game and just played it the thing would run for like 15 minutes?
Instead of throwing your life away living vicariously throw some commercial saturated medium, filling the coffers of industry whores, disengage, disconnect and dispose of this idiocy by-
1) having more sex
2) having even more sex
3) getting some excercise and having more sex
4) read a book, write some music or code
Fuck them ALL!
It's a Super BULL party. Matadors, wild bulls, etc. NFL lawyers not invited.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
Appearing in black face is illegal in many states.
Never trust a man wearing a coat and tie!
The term "Super Bowl" is protected by **trademark** not by copyright.
The broadcast, events, etc. of the trademarked "Super Bowl" are protected by copyright.
(Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, nor to I play one on Slashdot.)
YOU sue NFL.
Wait a minute...
That joke doesn't work because it makes Soviet Russia sound more free than the United States.
Oh, now I get it.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
The event is broadcast over the air (almost) everywhere in the US. Anyone can watch it if they have a TV and an antenna. The NFL gets paid from advertisers, not viewers. It's really not clear why someone should be punished for making a public broadcast publicly viewable. One could even argue that superbowl parties increase the number of viewers (it's more fun in a crowd), and in fact each person who watches makes the advertising that much more valuable. You really can't put you "content" out there publicly (over the air) and then bitch about who sees it where.
Not true at all. Speaking as that rare breed who is both a sports nerd and a fantasy/gaming nerd, the method of information retention is the same in both cases. Honestly, it's all about how much you care about the subject in question, and how much time and energy you invest in it, and to some extent your natural intelligence (specifically your ability to retain any information at all). I'm terrible at remembering to pay bills on time (thank you, auto-pay!), or that I've got a meeting at 10 AM tomorrow morning, or that we're out of milk and I need to pick some up from the store on the way home. I'm terrible at remembering those things because on some fundamental level I just don't care about any of them, even though my finances and my career are important to me and I love drinking milk. I can't define why those important things don't typically make any impression on my memory, but I can still name most or all of the main characters in David Eddings' Belgariad or any of a number of other fantasy novel series, and I can describe the tactics I used to beat some of the hardest battles in Baldur's Gate 2 (down to the actions of each specific member of my party, based on which members I chose to use in that particular play through the game), or the exact rules text of a Magic: the Gathering card which I don't even own and haven't played with or against for over a decade.
And by the same token, my favorite football team is in need of a wide receiver in this year's draft, and so I can tell you that Dez Bryant went to Oklahoma State and will probably go in the top ten picks of the draft. I can name another handful of the best receivers available, where they went to college, and whether or not they'd be a good fit for my team. And the NFL draft is months away. What's worse, I can tell you that I still remember wanting my team to draft Marcus McNeil, who went to Auburn and didn't allow a sack in four seasons there, because we needed a great tackle to anchor our offensive line. My team didn't draft Marcus McNeil (he went to the Chargers), and so the fact that he went to Auburn and didn't allow a sack (information that wasn't really relevant to my life to start with) should have LONG since been bumped out of my brain, in favor of things like that meeting at 10 AM tomorrow, or the names of members of my wife's extended family (no, I still don't know all of them yet, which leads to some very awkward moments at her family get-togethers).
Sports nerds (which are NOT the same as jocks; you can be one, both, or neither) have the same memory muscles as other types of nerds. We retain tons of information that even we know is irrelevant, like the key members of our fantasy team that went undefeated five years ago, and yet we can't get rid of it even if we wanted to. It's etched in our brains, perhaps forever. And it doesn't take a photographic memory to make that happen; just a really, really poor system of memory prioritization.
This story makes me want to start thowing Super "Bowl parites."
From the article: "and any audio portion of the performance or display is communicated by means of a total of not more than 6 loudspeakers."
-=[ place
There is no apostrophe after "de" in French. Ever.
I no longer have to watch the boring stuff that happens between the commercials then.
or you're a lousy friend
It's really too bad that "who dat" has its origins many years prior to the NFL coming to New Orleans.
The Wikipedia link is broken so all I have is the Google Cache version
The Pittsburgh Penguins started showing away playoff games on a jumbo-tron outside Mellon Arena for fans to sit in the parklet and watch. They did it for a couple of years and neither the NHL, FSN (local sports channel) or Versus objected. It was a fun time for all. But as soon as the Pens made the Stanley Cup Finals on NBC, NBC shut it down. They gave some excuse about it diminishing their individual household Nielson ratings. And they call a shitty game too!
Sugapablo
They can bite my shiny metal ass.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Much the same as a Beethoven symphony is just a collection of notes and rests, American football is a collection of plays and time between plays. You could, of course, play all the notes in a symphony in one unfettered cacophony, but you would be rather missing the music.
The time between the tackle on one play and the snap which begins the subsequent play is anything but empty. For one obvious example, there are substitutions to attempt to take advantage of the particular circumstances of each play. Other times, the team on offense chooses not to substitute in order to take advantage of the particular defense on the field, and they may even forgo the huddle (in which the plan for the next snap is customarily presented), trading what may have been a better plan for a better opportunity to catch the defense unprepared. The formations used on offense and defense are elaborate set pieces, full of point and counterpoint. Explaining everything that happens between plays would take far more time than we have here, but if you happen to be in Baton Rouge next Sunday, I would be honored to have you over for my small football-viewing event.
A forest is mostly empty space. The trees define it, but that which is between the trees is not insignificant.
It strikes me that the same mentality that drives the "football is boring" whine is just as prevalent in many other situations. I cannot tell you how many times I've heard scuba divers complaining there was "nothing to see" on the very same dive where I found myself utterly fascinated by the quantity and variety of marine life. Unfortunately for this discussion, it is somewhat easier to convince a diver they have overlooked something when you pull up photos of arrow crabs and nudibranchs and so on than it will probably be to convince a "football is boring" person of their misbelief -- for one thing, there are no big fluffy gills sticking out of offensive alignments, even in the red zone.
bars pay big time for Sunday ticket any ways same thing just to get your local RSN as well as NHL CI , NBA LP and MLB EI.
The NFL forgets that the people watching the game - wherever they may be - are the ones paying their salaries - the ones paying for tickets to games (win or lose), buying over priced merchandise, paying to keep the stadiums open and ALLOWING them/the networks to charge millions of dollars in advertising.
The FANS make the game as big as it is, not the owners, the league, the network or even the players.
NFL? Don't bite the hands that feed you...or it'll bite back.
The difference is that jocks memorize that crap, while many nerds have photographic memories.
No, no, a thousand times no. A jock plays sports. Some people in fact call them "sports". A nerd is someone who must understand things, where those things are in their sphere of interest; which might possibly encompass everything, but probably doesn't. The people who memorize statistics and dates related to sports are a subclass of "Sports Fan[atic]s". They don't necessarily understand a fucking thing, but they can tell you what (some baseball guy's) batting average was in April of 2001. It's fanaticism, not nerdhood. A racing fan could tell you who is in what car, with what numbers. A racing nerd could not only tell you who has the most powerful engine, but why.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
If slashdot is having a discussion of the Superbowl that enhances their business, then mentioning it probably violates something. One of our local radio stations used to sponsor a Superbowl Party and would rent buses to send people to the game. They were told they were no longer allowed to mention "Superbowl". They started referring to it as "The Big Game". Sad.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
As the games are BROADCASTED to the PUBLIC open and free, doesn't that make any copyright null and void?
No. But if they're transmitted using public airwaves, people should have the right to demodulate and watch them, and not have to pay extra for the privilege just because they happen to have worked out a way to make more money from it.
Remember those ads and trailer you couldn't fast forward through with a "compliant" dvd player ?
I remember that MOST of the dvds I took from a rental had them, while the shop version had it more rarely... at the time "all I had" was a dedicated "compliant DVD dedicated pci card" and a "mint" PowerDVD on a PII233 that was too weak to play dvds on it's own
(compaq deskpro...anyone remember them ? ended up being my "home media player" way back then...along with one of Logitech's early wireless keyboard / mouse combo... I remember buying 10 meters ps2 cable so that the receiver would be under the couch)
The moment I heard about dvdcss I invested in a larger HDD and learned to divx or vcd/svcd my rentals (thx Doom9, DVDdecrypter, DVD2AVI,TMPG) to escape the mandatory viewing of a POS movie trailer I didn't care about.
That and that RIDICULOUS fbi warning telling me I couldn't broadcast this movie in a Prison or Petrol Platform. lame.
All this to say... Nowadays they might be the same (didn't go in a rental in a looooong time), but long ago they weren't
(/rant finished; as you were)
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker
is the NFL hockey or football?
So... Am I allowed to watch the SuperBowl? Or any TV shows? I have FIOS cable service... Or do I have to leave home to find a legal TV set?
Is my wife allowed to join me?
Can a few friends come watch too? Can they bring snacks, or does that count as a form of entry payment?
Oh, wait. I don't like football, so I'm not watching anyway. And we recently got married, are combining our houses, and my otherwise small living room is a large pile of everything we both own and we can't sit anywhere or see the giant screen anyway.
I'll look up the commercials on my laptop later.
But, what about the TV I do watch when things are cleared out? Caprica? Lost?
This perennial problem has been solved many times before. It's not a "Super Bowl" party, it's merely an ordinary party held in honor of the final game of the U.S. professional football season. A "S***r B**l" party.
What states? Citation needed. I do not believe it's actually illegal in any state.
Cause that's what all my party invites say.
Besides, other than halftime for the show, we plan to watch Puppy Bowl, or maybe a real sport like Soccer or Snowboarding.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
It will if it's done right!
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
Screw the NFL, and the Saints - who proved through their head-hunting for Favre that they are nothing like Saints at all. If the Colts don't beat the Saints by AT LEAST 17 points, the fix is in. Besides, the NFL has hated Minnesota for decades anyway, and I was already resigned to the fact that, even if we had won, Peyton Manning would have carved us up like a huge rack of ribs - so I won't mind all that much seeing him do the same thing to the thugs from the Chocolate City.
NFL games have become so painful to watch. 30 seconds of football and then 3 minutes of advertising. I have to DVR these things now. If not for the DVR, I might never watch another NFL game.
Seriously, you have to pay to watch thurs night football now, Super Bowl adds cost millions of dollars for a 30 second slot. What more do they want?! Where the hell do they get off trying squeeze even more money out of people who are already hurting? Just shut up and let us watch football.
Where has reason in the world gone? Have we abandoned it in favor of power and politics?
I'm so happy we let our elected officials take bribes in return for re-election funds and a fucked up nonsensical IP regime.
If your TV has a refresh rate exceeding 120hz, a dot pitch less than .10mm, contrast ratio exceeding 10000:1 or screen resolution higher than 1920×1080 you need to negotiate an expensive contract with me to watch commercials during the superbowl.
Failure to pay will result in DMCA physical takedown action against your electrical utility pole. We can't have utility companies aiding and abedding the infringement of copyrights by providing power to your illegal television now can we?
In a room with all of the guys who are responsible for making the NFLs money, and this is not unique to the NFL, they are talking about how they can increase their profits. Someone brings up that small bars and such are profiting off their games and in particular the Super Bowl and so they push some legislation/trademark/copyright bullshit though.
And the kicker is that the Republican party as it stands will all vote for such a measure even thou they 'hate government regulation' and all that. (Oh and the Dems that vote for this kinda crap are just as slimey, but at least we can call them on it.)
Really, I know what I'm doing...Ohhhh, look at the shiny buttons!
Bars get the game via cable, for which they pay money. The cable companies know who their clients are and what their clients' businesses entail. If some of the content is not for general use, while some of the content is for general use, shouldn't it be up to the service deliverer (i.e. the cable company) to determine what service the customer receives and how much the customer should pay? Why is it up to the end customer, the bar, to determine what programs received legally over the valid cable connection they can (or cannot) show on their TV?
linquendum tondere
As the games are BROADCASTED to the PUBLIC open and free, doesn't that make any copyright null and void?
Whatever the intellectual merits of that theory, it is most certainly not the case under the current state of US law that public broadcast necessarily implies release to the public domain.
Dear Super Bowl lawyers,
Blow me.
Signed,
The internet.
"Yes, I have a Disaster Recovery Plan. It's called my Resume"
'SUPER BOWL' IS NOT A COPYRIGHT. IT IS A TRADEMARK.
/.ers trying to change IP law for the better look bad.
You ignorant idiots make all of us
Seriously.
don't call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright
Oh dear! Does that mean I'm committing a crime when I use the phrase "taking the Browns to the Super Bowl" as a euphemism for defecation?
According to your limited definition of "gods".
You see before various religions dreamt up the notion of the "one true god" there were many gods, some were good, others were ambivalent and some were downright evil. Even when this monotheistic notion came into play the "one true god" was not the benevolent creature you imagine, in fact he was quite vengeful and angry. Drowning villages, inflicting plagues, the angry bouncer of Eden, swords of fire and casting people into hell. Definitely not the all loving chap the church portrays him to be today.
Being a God does not make one good by definition, it just makes one powerful. So in this context the copyright cartel may be considered gods, just not nice gods.
As I've heard quoted, all men are atheists about most gods in human history, some of us just go one god further.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
"Super Bowl" may be copyrighted but "super Bowl" isn't. I'm having a super Bowl party.
What am I missing here?
The subject who is truly loyal to the Chief Magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures (Junius)
So a sports bar can use up to 4 screens up to 55 inches. Can't you then use the 4 to do a 2 x 2 tile to get to 110 inches? Yowza! 9 feet!
Even if they got the game over broadcast TV, they are still paying. That's why the game is broken up by ads. They are delivering hundreds of eyeballs to these ads. Nobody can tell me that the NFL isn't getting justly compensated. Ultimately the NFL wants more money. I mean who wouldn't?! The problem is, the NFL wants pay-per-view revenue and a broadcast-sized audience to sell to advertisers.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Sports are dirt-simple and don't compare to, say, chess, or subatomic particle physics, or how a microprocessor works.
But I see the definition of "nerd" has changed dramatically since my youth, now that everybody wants to be one. I never thought I'd see the day when we were actually popular! Back in my youth, if you called a sports nut a nerd he'd probably punch you.
Free Martian Whores!
Sports are dirt-simple and don't compare to, say, chess, or subatomic particle physics, or how a microprocessor works.
Sports may be simpler than computing, but I doubt it. Much of the complexity in sport is abstracted away by the body and its nervous system; since sports include humans, the human element is relevant. Something as apparently simple as the throwing of a javelin intersects not just materials technology and technique, but also an understanding of the behavior of the human body during that activity. Swimming involves fluid dynamics, and suits are continually being made from new materials which increase performance with each iteration. Biathlon, Triathlon... And all that pales in comparison to motorsport, which involves not only your precious CPU these days, but a whole lot more.
Subatomic particle physics is a pretty broad field, and one in which the state of the art is being continually refined. It's not impossible that all forces will eventually be boiled down to a single force and a simple set of rules. So I'll withhold my judgment there.
But I see the definition of "nerd" has changed dramatically since my youth, now that everybody wants to be one.
I grew up in Santa Cruz at a time when it was if not at, at least near the center of technical innovation; at the time, Borland was a thriving business located in Scotts Valley, Seagate did most of their business out of the same, and SCO was still a tech company with a product people wanted. The UCSC nerd contingent self-identified as 'geeks' as an alternative to 'nerds', implying people with style and possibly even social skills. I was born too late to be a student (and at the time, not interested enough in academia to participate anyway, nor could I afford to attend even then) but I became part of the crowd anyway, after meeting some other members of that set via the local BBS scene, which was huge. Per capita, we probably had more BBSes than anywhere else, but I certainly haven't done any survey.
I can't help but think that the adoption of the term 'geek' in that set (which involved substantial crossover with other internet-connected and -participating schools of the period like Rutgers and MIT) helped drive mainstream acceptance of the word 'nerd'.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I'm a bit older than you, when I was in high school the words nerd, geek, and egghead were synonymous.
Free Martian Whores!
I don't even watch bowling; so this doesn't impact me.
Don't blame me, I voted for Cthulhu.
My sister is having a Superb Owl party that just happens to coincide with that sports game thing...
The actual law has nothing to do with your home:
...so unless you live in a restaurant, and the Superbowl is pre-empted by a Mahler concert, you are probably pretty safe...
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000110----000-.html
What it states is:
"...in the case of a food service or drinking establishment...no such audiovisual device has a diagonal screen size greater than 55 inches, and any audio portion of the performance or display is communicated by means of a total of not more than 6 loudspeakers..."
and also:
"...communication by an establishment of a transmission or retransmission embodying a performance or display of a nondramatic musical work... no such audiovisual device has a diagonal screen size greater than 55 inches, and any audio portion of the performance or display is communicated by means of a total of not more than 6 loudspeakers..."