Gonna Be Scarce

It's almost October, and that time for the fun and games known as women's basketball press guide season. So the posts will be few and far between the next three weeks.

Um, Where to Begin?

Mike Masterson turns his attention this Saturday to the eeeeee-villllll that is the blogosphere in his op-ed column in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. We get the usual set of new media hater cliches ("pajama-clad pundits," "Internet rumors," "accuse-anything Internet").

I've known Mike for a while -- since back when he was the editor at the NW Arkansas Times -- and there's probably much more to this than meets the eye on the column. It comes for me at a very bad time to counter, but in time, I think will get a written rejoiner.

His premise is the heart of the series I work with on the side at KUAF, "We're History," where Kyle Kellams and I dissect the presentism that runs rampant in the media.

One of the money quotes in Mike's column:
"Sad to say, calculated rumors, shaded truth and outright lies have become commonplace in what 20 years ago was the primary marketplace of reported facts."

Um. Gee. About 25 years ago, I was still working in a newsroom. Guess what, there was plenty of calculated rumors and shaded truth to go around about one Edwin Edwards, high-times Gov of the great state of Louisiana. Some of them started by Eddie himself. Remember when he famously quipped that he couldn't lose unless he was caught in bed with a dead girl or a live boy?

The difference? Anyone can publish the rumors today.

There's more in this, and with deadlines looming I'll let this ride for now with just one small counterpoint.

Does Mike forget that a little over 100 years ago, that great bastion of journalistic principle, William Randolph Hearst, was trying to foment a war with Spain? How about those upstanding politicos of the party newspapers in the 1800s? Too old? Yesterday's freak-show drug addict becomes today's sage -- Hunter S. Thompson did call for Hubert Humphrey to be castrated and said things of Richard Nixon that, well, remain scatological even in the 21st century.

Shouldn't Be News, But It Is

For a couple of years, I've preached the risks of college athletes in the public domain -- and the threat the simple cell phone camera. Travel columnist Robert Smith in one of our local newspapers regales the readers with stories of the quick use of cell cameras to the Arkansas attorney general's office to build evidence against gougers after the hurricanes.

The AG asked folks to take before and after snaps of gas prices, and he got over 1,000 text messages with attachments plus another 1,500 emails.

The duh, I mean, money quote:

"The effort shows the value of the technology as a watchdog tool."

And, I might add, a not so subtle reminder to Matt Lienart.

Scary Things

While waiting for my iPod to sync . . .

A look at the world of news outside sports that should scare the bejezus out of some fans and some adminstrators.

First up, the hacking of Sarah Palin's email account. Very cute. Done with anonymizer software. Posted with screen names. Ha, ha, ha, says the blogger. Until the FBI arrives. Guess what? Within 24 hours, the cyber division had a person of interest, knew exactly what computer was used through what local ISP to perform the hack, post the data and brag about the reveal.

What have I told my friends in the blogosphere over and over (and my colleagues who often try to dip their toes in anonymously) ? There is no such thing as anonymous, just degrees of secrecy.

That said, next up is the hot new product for trying to Hack Sarah Palin (sounds like a teen movie title, doesn't it?). The Iron Key is a USB device with advanced encryption, a secure browser and claims to be able to allow users the ability to surf anonymously. Either this $75 USB key is one heck of a ripoff for a 1 GB of storage, or a huge threat to everyone that must deal with the public with transparency.

Last of all, the rise of hacktivism -- which is what the person or persons who went into Palin's email would call themselves. Bill O'Reilly's website got hacked, and personal data of the users of the site were revealed. There's much more on this from ZDNet, but it reminds those of us in the public sector of the data we need to protect, and the lengths to which the upset will go to achieve their ends.

Google Rules: Just Ask UAL

Another item that flew past -- no pun intended -- last week was the re-emergence of an almost six-year old story about United Airlines' bankruptcy. It went to the top of Google's news crawler and cause the markets to flip out. UAL's stock crashed on the mistaken belief that the major airline was going into bankruptcy again.

Unfortunately, it was just a stick in the Google cache -- mistakenly posted as new news. Even though it came down after 13 minutes, UAL stock went down almost a billion.

How did it happen, and how can it impact you in the college sports world? Consider what the impact would be to your school if old NCAA investigation stories happen to pop up right before the dark period for coaches heading into signing day?

There's a great primer on how it happened and what it means on the Association of College and Research Libraries website today:

Information is Power -- Even When it's Wrong

Amy Fry wrote the entry, and the whole thing is required reading. However, my money quote is this:

If any one of you has been underestimating the role of Google in the information food chain, STOP.

Waiting For Downloads

A moment for more thoughts on the future of the {YOUR MASCOT NAME HERE} Channel. The ability to project one's brand belongs to those who retain rights, and when yielding rights, does so in a way that maintain as much control as possible while trading that for A) filthy lucre; B) better distribution tools.

Case in point: ESPN360.

Look, I'm not the only person in the world who's 17-year-old son has an overwhelming desire to watch one out-of-market team whenever, however. And I'm not the only person who took the time to build a cheap (less than $350) but screaming fast, tuned for video lunchbox computer who's only purpose in its digital life is to drive a plasma screen HDTV.

Open weekend courtesy of Hurricane Ike allowed some quality tuning and tweaking time with the box, and by the end of Saturday night, the games we were watching were of no less quality than the old over-the-air analog signals I grew up with. To have the access was well worth the trade in quality. More important -- the price? Well, thank heaven I switched to a certain global monolith that provides internet access AND free ESPN360.

In the space of the last six months, the entire landscape in college sports broadcasting has changed. And no, it's not just because Will went over the wall from spin.

The Olympics have shown that IPTV is now a reality. That the consumer does want his MTV. And his syncro diving. And he wants it now; unless now is five hours from now when he gets off work and for him, time stands still.

CBS is streaming the SEC. NBC will stream the NFL. MLB and NBA will stream locally (which, when you think about it is absurd -- the people who want it are ex-patriots living in other markets -- perhaps it won't take 25 years before Sunday Ticket gets reinvented on-line).

Back to the school's channel. I've been surprised by the amount of ferocious shelling we've taken the past two weeks from folks who want Razorback football streamed. Other schools do it, why don't you? On the surface, a legit question. The main reason -- no offense to others -- but our games are monetized with contractual value. Even when NBC "gives away" NFL streaming, it's still commercially supported and while free to the consumer is not free by any means.

Thus, smaller schools and less popular sports can continue to give away video streaming because it has not gained the popularity yet to have serious commercial value. That is no slap to those others, in fact, it should be an encouragement.

NCAA men's basketball did not become anything important until ESPN, then CBS, took the flyer to run every game and create a sensation. Ask any aspiring band, you make the MP3s, you put them on the podsafe network and you hope that by building popularity someday you get paid.

The same is true for college sports. Women's basketball, softball, baseball and other emerging sports have a real future on-line, but only if schools are attentive to the hoovering contracts of the content providers. While picking up the fully-commercial properties of football and in some areas men's basketball, they seek to lock up other sports or entire schools and conferences. The goal is to create excess inventory to float against advertising sale, or simply to put content on the shelf as an exclusive.

Here's where schools must insist on the A & the B. If you want to take it all, you must pay a price that will counter-balance the recruiting blow that unavailable (or subscriber based) content inflicts. Think about it. This is a national recruiting market. If proud parents know they can remain virtually linked to the kids -- streaming video, a quality website, solid communications avenues -- they'll let them go anywhere. The schools where that isn't available are at a disadvantage. That's where the B comes in -- if they don't insist, don't give away any more rights than necessary.

Or one day, you discover you can't stream you own stuff outside your own state.

More Streams Join the Fray

First, it was NBC with the Olympics. Then MLB and the NBA joined in with local streaming. Last week, CBS announced it would provide free live streams of its SEC game of the week.

Michael Hiestand has a great review of this in Wednesday's USA TODAY. He repeats the argument taken as conventional wisdom -- free streaming of content available concurrently through advertising support on television only widens the audience.

The payoff quote:

And networks are being convinced online simulcast won't cannibalize the big bucks tied up in TV, figuring you'll watch online only if you can't get to a TV set, or you'll log on as you watch TV.

Sounds familiar to this space.

Live Blog Impacts

Some things we attempt on faith, and creating a game-day live-blog for your primary sports on first blush seem like a leap into unproven territory. Is it worth the time? What happens when things go bad for your team? Will fans find it useful?

Several schools go before us, notably our colleagues at Wisconsin, with highly successful game-day blogs. Our began with a somewhat quiet launch -- no promotion, just a part of the game-day fan instruction page and a link from the front page.

Week One -- the football blog was the No. 3 story in unique viewers, second only to the post-game story and an extremely popular story on the release of the new uniforms. There were some questions about the efficacy of doing the blog, particularly when some unfortunate computer issues led to interruption of live stats. Why waste time blogging while the live stats are dead?

Two quick answers emerge. First, the live blog allows fans to jump across to a stream of information that is agile and able to get through FTP and connection issues. So it plugs the gap. The second reason is far more important.

Right along with encouraging two-way conversation with fans -- which, quite frankly a game-day blog is not about -- the most important thing a website can provide is value-added content. Here is the true value of the live blog. Yes, stat-heads like myself enjoy reading the stats and seeing the play-by-play transaction. What fans want are description, interpretation.

One of our coaches on the road told me how convenient it was to keep up with the game in an airport on his mobile device. A fan that was hearing impaired, thrilled to be able to read color commentary that was never available before. Another long-time follower of the website, keeping the stat viewer and the blog open, as he described it, getting his play-by-play (the raw stats) and his color (the blog).

Week two saw the number jump three times -- the game-day blog in 24 hours became the No. 1 story on the site, with the post-game story at number two. Both of our non-conference games, not exactly traffic drivers, now set the stage for a big number with our first SEC game in two weeks.

For the media relations office, again, why range off into the land of bloggers? It's about content, and the ability of the institution to bring an official account of the event for its fans. How different is this from radio play-by-play? The beauty of the blog is the ability to interject other details that perhaps radio or TV can't, or no longer will, relay. The reaction of the crowd to plays, the songs of the halftime band set, the names of the captains, the little side notes.

We'll open up a little more in two weeks, looking to add more fan-based details. I did get my first tailgating photos, which one managed to be added to the blog. With any luck in the pregame portion, we'll add more of those kind of interactions. Perhaps not to the extent just yet of some of the pro venues and some colleges that are encouraging the use of camera phones to send in fan shots during the game, but we're working on getting there.

Twitter -- coming in the near future.

And You Were Thinking What?

More tales from the Dark Facebook side: Kutztown University senior Adam LaDuca is forced to resign as the head of the Pennsylvania College Republicans because of an ill-advised description of Barack Obama. We'll not repeat the line, but here's a shock -- "a comment he later said he regretted."

OK, let's concede the future will be filled with soon-to-be middle-aged politicians who will be haunted (and forgiven due to the ubiquitousness of the medium) by stupid jokes and statements of their youth.

Still, how many more examples do you need to get the idea: post nothing you wouldn't expect to be read by your worst enemy, your current or future employer, your current or future spouse/partner.

Plenty of Labor Day

Sorry about the pace of posts here; it's been packing and moving time for the realignments at Arkansas. So on this Labor Day, it was moving day. With any luck, the pace will return later. Until then, for the rest of you, enjoy your day off.

All The News Fit to Browse

Peggy Drexler gives us a chilling take on the mind-set of the American journalism consumer with her McClatchy-Tribune distributed column. The gist of the Cornell psychology professor's column is that the cloud that is the media provides everything to the reader -- but not in the best of ways. It becomes incredibly easy to tune into the news that you want, rather than at times the news that you might need. Pointing to the political situation, it is easy to descend into a worm hole of reinforcing coverage to one's preconceived notions. Think Barack Obama is getting poor treatment because of race; there's a blog for that. Think Hillary Clinton is getting the shaft on gender; plenty of news coverage there. Think John McCain's getting the short end of opinion; lots of that too.

Where Drexler goes with this is a bit difficult to accept. The point is this new "mob" of media is bad, and that somehow we may be at fault. Can't agree. America's journalistic past was once dominated by the "party" press; newspapers funded by and supporting particular political groups or points of view. This is as old as our free press. The difference is the ease with which it may be started, and the low barrier to entry. From her column:

How can we blame The Media for stepping out of bounds when the lines have been washed awy like sidewalk calk in a rainstorm?

Better to say that the rain -- in the form of new technology -- has removed the artificial lines created by the professional media.

I Could Not Say It Better

This post dates to late July, and came out as a part of a news feed in early August. For those trying to understand the end of the sports journalism world as we know it, this blog entry at From the Bleachers says it all.

Titled "Exodus," it chronicles the departure from ink-and-paper some of the key sports journalists and their re-emergence (and some would say re-invigoration) in the all-digital world.

One of the focus points is Tony Barnhart. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution columnist -- and past-president of the Football Writer's Association -- is more active, timely and relevant in his on-line work for the AJC blog. Not in the FTB blog, but this was most evident as Barnhart broke details about the two huge SEC TV deals, telling many of us in the schools more about what was happening than we were picking up through official sources.

Postscript: If you didn't believe in the end of the world, not two weeks after his blog entry that focused on Barnhart -- the venerable columnist takes a "voluntary" buyout to leave the AJC.

New Media is Not a Zero-Sum Game

My favorite icon of mediathink to bash is the zero-sum game. If you allow choice, it will dilute the product. If you provide what is seen as competitive content, it will destroy the share and ratings. If we chose this method of delivery, we must exclude all others.

The new media is a firehose, and guess what NBC is now learning? The same lesson CBS figured out during the NCAA Final Four. Interestingly enough, more is actually . . . more.

This just in from NBC Universal: ratings are going up. Up for the traditional network broadcast window. Up for the ancillary network delivery. And astronomically up through new media.

This space has been harshly critical of NBC's handling of past Olympics as they sought to bring in more views by taking the sports out and putting the human interest in. Someone caught the clue that after Athens that A) the sappy, super-saccharine soap-opera approach was neither bringing in the female demo they were touting in 1996 and 2000 (no one wants to watch the whole event, just the highlights); and B) those darn internets were providing the spoiler role to time-delayed sports.

Since the internet genie wasn't going back in the bottle, NBC has embraced the horror and gone uber-geek. Their play is paying dividends. According to AP, NBC Universal has reported 1.7 million video streams off USA's frog-squashing int he 400 relay alone; plus another 1.5 emailed to friends of the same.

Why?

It's not supply and demand; it's creating demand. You can watch almost anything, at any time. TiVo, meet Silverlight. NBC figured out that given the choice, fans will opt for their HD TVs and the Nielson book over their computers or phones. But for those that need that option, instead of shutting out the other content vehicles, NBC is now seeing a half-million phone downloads the first two days. Small, yes. Fantastically beyond estimates? Oh hell yes.

And the money quote:

NBC Universal worried in past Olympics years that its decision to air much of the events on cable outlets like CNBC, MSNBC and USA would siphon interest from prime-time, which is still where the network earns the bulk of its advertising revenue. But the opposite proved to be true and, this year, the same thing has happened with the digital content, said Gary Zenkel, president of NBC Olympics.

The takeaway lesson for college sports? Don't restrict yourself based on the old-network paradigms of zero-sum gain. Exclusive partners within a medium? Certainly. But don't let one medium exclude the other. Fan choice for interaction is driven by circumstance. Most would rather buy a ticket and be there. If not, they'll watch TV. If not, they'll watch streaming video. If not, they'll take audio by phone. And so on.

And every one of those modes serves a different audience, with a different price point. It can all generate both interest and profit.

However, somewhere, out there, the 21st century embodiment of H.L. Mencken's Puritan waits to lock down new media based on the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, might not watch the TV.

Unrelated? I Think Not

Gannett announced it was calling for 1,000-person reduction in force nationwide today. That's about 15 per editorial staff if I'm averaging the math right across the chain. Obviously, it won't fall equally on papers, but that comes a day after WEHCO, the corporate owner of the major paper in our state and others, would be freezing salaries. Those two tie together how? Aside from speaking to the trend in traditional journalism of economic woe, the last time WEHCO held the line like that? According to the current media reports, that was when they were starting their battle with Gannett in the Little Rock market back in the late 70s, early 80s.

And speaking of the late 70s, Russia is bringing back a golden oldie -- Evil Capitalist Plot To Subvert Will Of Workers. The Times (UK) has this delicious article about the party line from the Kremlin going retro for the Georgian invasion. You see, Comrades, it was really Vice-President Dick Cheney's conspiracy to prevent the election of Barak Obama. Seriously. I wouldn't kid about a Soviet, excuse me, Russian news item. Ah, for the days of Pravda.

So who is providing the Truth in Russia. Those pesky internets are at it again. Of course, the Russians launched their cyberattack on the Georgian domains right along with their tanks rolling into the country. Google stepped up to help out the Georgian government with some server mirroring to thwart the DoS attack -- and at the close of business that day GMail went missing for 90 minutes. Coincidence?

I digress. So how does this Russian load of high quality propaganda sync with the loss of American journalists jobs? Goes back to the old Citizen Media quandary. Who will pay for the journalism we need? The good news -- the media is evolving, and many of these journalists are going over the side into independent production. The bad news -- we may have fewer people to stay vigilant on the little stories. The ones that blossom into big significant ones. Like this break in at DNC headquarters. Or some FOIs. Or some missed minutes from a meeting. Why are those things potentially missed? Cause the papers are busy giving us what we want, which of course is more coverage of Angelina's twins.

For the college PR business, it will put even more emphasis on a Fan First approach. If the paper's cutting back, who will cover the volleyball team? If the TV station is consolidating staff and coverage into buying syndicated programming at 5 or 6 pm rather than local news -- forget local live event production -- it puts even more value on new media operations that can produce IPTV streams. Well, unless you sold those rights away.

A Pair of Privacy Issues

A pair of media outlets bring us two very private sets of details, but both invasions of privacy were self-inflicted.

The more salacious is today's Deadspin, and relates to a pair of athletes discovered modeling. That's nothing new, Gabbe Reese. The fact they were nude -- ah, that's new. One wonders what these Division I BCS conference athletes were thinking. That no one would notice?

The second relates to HIPPA, and the couple of very important exceptions to that reasonably draconian rule. The feds can rain down very significant fines on health care workers, and those who handle health care records. Group A that is totally immune -- the media. While it may seem an invasion of privacy, there is nothing that prevents them from printing health-related information. Group B -- the person who's health is being commented upon.

So, when The Sporting News texts directly to a BCS football athlete to confirm his torn ACL, and said athlete texts back confirmation -- nothing can be done.

Don't Let Your Mouth Write a Check Your Relay Can't Cash

NBC's swimming analyst Rowdy Gaines erupted, "Who's talkin' now?!?"

Heading into the men's 400-meter freestyle final, there was the distinct odor of upset in the air, courtesy of French world record holder Alain Bernard.

"The Americans? We're going to smash them. That's what we came here for," Bernard said.

Bernard had the race. He had the lead. Unfortunately, USA had the motivation.

"We don't say anything until it's over," Cullen Jones said.

"The Frenchies were talking stuff, and we just took care of business," anchor Jason Lezak said.

Now, Bernard goes into the history books for perhaps the most ill-advised trash talking. Ever. Of course, Michael Phelps came very, very close to his own moment -- first with his Speedo body suit hanging dangerously low, then second when his gutteral yelp of victory appearing to start with a "fffuuu," then appears in the slow-mo to quickly transition without the golden image killing consonants into a yeaaaaaahhhhh.

And, slow motion reveals all -- including the final five meter look over by Bernard at Lezak. Lezak trailed by a half second starting the leg. Lezak looks back, and it's like he's showing the Frenchman his still-beating heart before touching the wall and smashing the tricolor.

Did I Mention How Cool Silverlight Is?

For the past half hour, I've sat and watched men's individual epee. Who knew? Who cared?

Thanks to this streaming content, I'm mesmerized by watching these two guys go at each other in what seems more like barroom brawl -- the lighting is dark and spotlight. They scream. They taunt. They yell. The crowd has airhorns.

The beauty of this stuff is the cameras -- very crisp, 16x9 ratios and I'm guessing high def capture. It streams well, even for something like epee that has fast moving fine details. But, I think one of the really great things is the cinema verite of the nat sound from the arenas.

It was the same on Russia-Iran men's basketball. No overblown American announcers. Just squeaking sneakers, thumping dribbles and the occasional cheer.

Another brick in the network wall is coming down.

Kudos to NBC

The Olympics show us the future of sports media production. Silverlight is all it was hyped up to be. The key is bringing the sports to the fan and giving them the ability to choose and manage.

Today, I've spent time watching the NBC soccer and basketball channels on my DIRECTV, where I have a special interactive menu. Until figuring this out today, I was at a confused loss for what was on when. With the 12-hour time difference and the usual feature approach by NBC, I was ready to just take a pass.

Not any more. After enjoying several looks at things I'd have never watched -- who knew that Becky Hammons was now a Russian, the New Zealand team darn near didn't advance, Germany's got great women's soccer possession skills, and there's the President at beach volleyball -- I'm currently taking in the live feed of Iran versus Russia men's hoops via Silverlight.

Given the right tools -- Tricasters and broadcast cameras -- plus Silverlight, there's no reason why every school can't be its own network via IP.

Simple Explanations are Always the Best

Caller to the Dennis Miller Show this Friday:

"I had a thought, that became a rumor"

And thus, the genesis explanation of more than a few internet news items.

Rapid Response Engagement

Referencing back to the CoSIDA presentation, here is a perfect example this past week of the marriage of monitoring and engagement. This is a real world, real name situation. In the course of the relaunch of our website, it has drawn new attention to all things Razorback. Two days ago, a moderator of the largest fan board made a post around 6:50 p.m. that a link on the Razorback Foundation pointed to a former coaches' now closed website. I picked it up while reading through boards around 7:30, and forwarded a note to those who needed to know. Within 30 minutes, one of the people commenting on the board took it direct to the AD.

In the past, a letter or even an email might linger. With the speed of the 'net, that's just not going to work. By 8:40, I'm emailing this person to thank him and assure him that we were making contact with the vendor to correct it. At just after 9 p.m., a segment of my email is quoted out on the board and after that the thread petered out with generally positive comments that the department was reacting to the error.

There are a host of the old lessons within this event:
Turn the speech into a conversation -- by listening and responding, we gained positive credit.
Digital assets are incredibly portable -- as I've always tutored our athletes, staff and coaches, anything digital -- in this case an email -- is very easy to cut and paste anywhere.
Rumors move at the speed of light -- no telling how this morphs if ignored, as it was heating up within a couple of hours.
Public schools are glass houses -- every email, every call, every detail is publicly available and subject to review.

Not 24 hours later, we had an all-blog event where one prominent statewide news blogger picks up just a part of a bit on one of the statewide radio shows. He riffs on what was said, and doesn't pick up until the next day that it was a practical joke played by one host on the other. But, the first part related to our football press guide, and it launched a thread on a pair of boards. Again, fast emails to the host and the board admins discovered the truth -- the fact it was a joke -- and that got posted on the boards. This effectively shuts down the thread, and the boards move on.

The lesson once again -- you must stay involved with all of your communities: physical and virtual.