The World Association of Newspapers Takes ftm To Task For Saying Rugby’s Attempts To Restrict Internet News Pictures Circulation For The World Cup Is A Commercial Issue And Not A Freedom Of The Press Issue

Well, Timothy Balding, WAN’s president, rather took exception to that. “I was frankly disturbed by your scathing commentary on our latest fight to prevent a sports organization – the International Rugby Board (IRB) – from holding the 2007 World Rugby Cup hostage to its commercial interests. When an enlightened media commentator won’t grasp the press freedom issues at stake here, we all have cause to be concerned.”

According to WAN the IRB wants to impose Internet sites with limitations of five still news pictures per half and two photos if there is extra time even though many such sites are natural extensions of a newspaper’s multiplatform presentation, let alone the other commercial ventures out there. Even in print there are restrictions – no superimposing headlines or captions on pictures if they obscure any advertising within the image. And there are limits on audiovisual content for websites and mobile.

ftm had argued the World Cup is an international sporting event that is privately owned and that the courts on both sides of the Atlantic have ruled that owners of such events are well within their rights to set coverage rules, no matter how much the media may detest such. ftm argued, therefore, that there were commercial ways of battling the IRB nonsense, but freedom of the press is not one of them, as even the courts have ruled.

ftm background

Blacklists – 21st Century Reality
Journalists independent of State media have been barred from court proceedings in Azerbaijan where a former government minister stands accused of abuse of power. South Africa’s State broadcaster has been accused of blacklisting commentators who just might spin a line different – and critical – of the government. We are so fortunate, in the “west,” for immunity to such impunity.

Rugby World Cup Officials Want To Be The Ones Feeding Quick Unlimited News Pictures Game Coverage To Internet Sites, and Not The International News Agencies. It’s FIFA’s Football World Cup All Over Again And We Do Remember What Happened There, Don’t We?
Organizers of major international sporting events are trying ever more to make a buck from their franchise. Why, they ask, should they allow international news agencies to feed news pictures around the world in seconds to Internet sites, when they could instead provide their own news picture coverage and get all that money?

Blame and Shame on South Africa’s Public Broadcaster
Independence and transparency separates State broadcasters from public broadcasters. Or, that is the theory. Blacklisting political commentators by South Africa Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) news officials is bad enough. Trying to cover it up is worse.

The Big Question of the Jyllands-Posten Editor: If You Had to Do It All Over Again, Would You Have Printed the Mohammed Cartoons? Answer: “Hard to Tell!"
The deputy editor-in-chief of Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper at the center of the controversy in the printing of the Mohammed cartoons last September, peered out from the stage gazing onto hundreds of fellow editors from around the world and asked himself the question he knew they wanted to ask: “Would you do it over again?”

FIFA Capitulates, Agrees There Should Be No Coverage Distinction Between Text and Pictures, And Allows Real-Time Unlimited World Cup Internet Coverage For Both
It was a battle of business titans – FIFA, football’s governing body, wanted to protect its own commercial World Cup Internet interests by forcing the media to accept accreditation rules that prohibited any match picture appearing on the Internet until after the final whistle. The world’s media joined together in refusing FIFA’s terms, threatening freedom of the press issues, getting governments involved, and warning FIFA commercial sponsors of media difficulties ahead. Result: FIFA hoisted the white flag. No need for a penalty shootout – it’s the World’s Media 1, FIFA 0.

Major World Journalist Organizations Reject Government-imposed or Suggested Codes of Conduct, Guidelines, or Even New Laws Restricting Freedom of the Press In Response To The Danish Cartoons, But They Agree That Journalists Should Not Create Unnecessary Tension By Promoting Hatred Or Inciting Violence
Major news organizations including the International Federation of Jounalists (IFJ) and several all-news channels have held separate meetings in the past days to discuss the Danish cartoon controversy and to determine what has been learned and what needs to be done to prevent similar distress in the future.

The courts have focused on how much investment the rights holder has made for the gathering and disseminating information. If the rights holder has made a significant investment of money, technology and staffing to provide information, then they more than likely can license that information. But if it is simple information like listing the year’s schedule of events then, no, they can’t.

The European Court of Justice – the highest EC legal body – ruled in a specific case a couple of years back that while European companies printing English football schedules were safe in printing fixture schedules because “neither the obtaining, verification, nor presentation of the contents of a football fixtures list attests to substantial investment which could justify protection” for the so-called sui generic protection given for information whose creation required substantial investment. In layman’s terms, if there is substantial investment on the part of the organizers in providing information, and the holding of a rugby world cup would fall into that, then the organizers can set their own licensing rules.

The US 11th Circuit Court of Appeals basically said the same thing in a ruling FOR the Professional Golf Association (PGA) and against a media organization, and the US Supreme Court confirmed that ruling by refusing to hear an appeal filed by several media organizations.

The US court specifically ruled that the PGA had made a significant investment of money, technology, and staffing in order to provide a real-time scoring system, and that significant commitment justified the selling or licensing of that information to others. A media company had claimed it had the right to sell the golf scores it received from a tournament to web sites. The PGA wanted a built-in delay on those web sales unless the web site took out a license with the PGA for the results.

Balding makes the point the World Cup is not a private event, it is a public event “engaging nations – this is not someone’s private party.”

He continues, “The press is being told, among other things how to use the photographs it takes at the matches – with no text on them and not positioned vis a vis ads or other material which don’t meet the IRB’s tastes, and that it cannot use more than a very limited number of match photographs on its digital platforms.

“Why not a limit on the number of words that can be written? Or a ban on negative remarks about the matches or prior censorship of the photos, in case the IRB doesn’t like them. With current trends, such developments are barely a caricature. The IRB says it ‘owns’ the matches and can exploit them as it sees fit – you agree with them and direct your ire against the media for making this a press freedom issue. For you and the IRB, business is business, thanks very much.”

The point ftm made in its original article was that the Rugby World Cup is a privately owned sporting event. The people who “own” the event are in the business of making money. By placing their proposed restrictions on Internet still pictures coverage they figure they can make some more money from their own Internet site that won’t have numerical limits, and they can make money elsewhere by providing unlimited coverage for a cost. So, it’s not that the coverage won’t be available, it’s a matter of who is providing that coverage and if it doesn’t come from the organizers then what restrictions might be imposed. That’s a commercial situation that should be handled on a commercial basis for which the media is quite capable.

Last year, for instance, The Associated Press made a point of not accepting accreditation to cover the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) tournament in Hawaii when accreditation rules called for severe limits on AP pictures usage. The local media backed the AP and after two days of basic scores coverage and not much else the LPGA backed down and said it was all a misunderstanding.

A couple of years back the English football authorities tried it on as well. But the national newspapers fought back in a commercial way. Newspapers started cropping or choosing pictures that ensured no sponsor name appeared either on a jersey or in the background on a advertising boarding; in text stories there was absolutely no mention of any of the sponsors, whatever PR activities the sponsors get up to in promoting their World Cup activities did not see the light of journalistic day. It didn’t take long for the sponsors to vent their anger at the football authorities and the coverage restrictions went away.

Heineken will have much more influence with the rugby officials than WAN when it complains there is no more mention of the “Heineken Cup” but rather it’s just “The Rugby Cup” or “the tournament” or such? Copyright lawyers will go mad but, frankly, Heineken and the other sponsors don’t really need or want this nonsense.

There used to be a good understand between organizers and the media. The media would cover the event, there was plenty of pre-event publicity, and the organizers kept their fingers out of the reporting cookie jar.

Obviously the consultants have come along and have persuaded sports promoters that they’re giving up revenue opportunities that they should take advantage of. In doing so they are upsetting that relationship that has served the media and organizers well over many years, and frankly it seems just sheer stupidity that sporting organizers would want to upset that particular apple-cart. It’s another case where the consultants should be sent packing.

Balding stresses the IRB issue remains a freedom of the press issue because “access to and free flow of information, guaranteed by human rights conventions, cannot be selectively applied to public events.” And he thinks our belief that this is just a commercial issue is a red herring.

“Newspapers are businesses. Of course they are,” he expounds. “Will they make money selling their photographic coverage of this and other sports events? I do hope so. That’s how they live, pay their staff and, hopefully, safeguard their independence. Except in places like Cuba or Vietnam and three dozen other nations.”

ftm said freedom of the press issues should be confined to getting newspapers free from state control, and getting jailed journalists out of jail and the like, and to that Balding responded, “Is restricting press coverage of sports on the same level as the murder and imprisonment of journalists? I don’t even have to answer that, but I find it bizarre that because we fight to prevent the latter, you don’t believe we can classify the first as also a free press violation, on an entirely different level of seriousness of course.”

But ftm also pointed out if all of this was true - that it was a freedom of the press issue and not a commercial issue -- then how come television for years has accepted that organizers of sports events, also involving countries, have the right to sell the broadcast rights to those events for “free” or pay television, usually for a considerable amount of money. In addition there are ever tighter restrictions each year on how much video can be shown after the event on competitive TV stations and the Internet. Surely, the fact that one part of the media – television – has accepted this principle has opened the door for the organizers to impose similar restrictions on still news pictures?

Balding is having none of that. “Commercial imperatives are not the only or even the principle question at stake. European regulations in this area have not been drawn up on the grounds of competition law or fair practice but on that of the protection of pluralism and free access to information.

“That TV companies are prepared to pay is, frankly, their problem; they get their money back, and more, by themselves selling expensive ads around matches. The TV industry, as far as I know, has no problem with all of this and the public shouldn’t, either, because the games are ‘freely’ available. The press is not in the same logic, commercially or otherwise, and shouldn’t have to be.”

Well, we take some issue with that. The fact is the news agencies sell their news pictures services to the media (analogue and digital) for substantial subscriptions. That’s how they stay in business, just as TV does either by advertising or selling subscriptions. Newspapers and others put such photos on their web sites and bring in substantial revenue from advertising on those pages.

The way the IRB intends to enforce its rules is by making journalists accept them when applying for accreditation to cover the tournament. Balding, who spent the last week in Washington at various media events, should have remembered it was there that former First Lady Nancy Reagan, when she was fighting drug use by the young, coined that great expression, “Just Say No”.

That’s all the media really has to do with the IRB – just say no, and don’t sign the accreditation forms. We suggested to Mr. Balding that he write all his members recommending just that.

WAN has received support for its campaign from an unexpected corner. A former director of New Zealand rugby has written an open letter denouncing the IRB for "improperly seeking to interfere in the gathering and publishing of news in the short term pursuit of the dollar."David Rutherford, former chief executive of New Zealand Rugby Union, did not mince words. "Failure by bodies like the IRB to observe human rights norms in pursuit of the dollar undermines rugby as a sport as much as drug cheats do," he said. "Such a failure undermines democracy in the nations in which rugby is played and it undermines the fundamental ethics and values of sport, and rugby in particular. There has to be a balance between the IRB's understandable desire to maximize revenue and the democratic right of the news media to gather news," he said.

No doubt its much easier for WAN to get the politicians on board with the cry of “freedom of the press” and in battle almost but not all weapons can be used, but this writer still believes, in spite of Mr. Balding’s written spanking, that this is really a commercial matter and the media have many weapons at their disposal in fighting such a commercial matter.

“Freedom of the press” should be left to aid those who really cannot help themselves or in court to stop governments restricting media democracy. The media is quite able to fight the IRB nonsense via commercial means.

One can hardly wait to see what the International Olympic Committee might try for next year’s Olympic Games, and we all know how “Freedom of the Press’ plays in Beijing.

Australian Court Rules For The Media - April 24, 2007

Score one for the media over sports organizations trying to restrict coverage rights. An Australian court has issued a preliminary judgment that non-rights holders to Australian National Rugby League (NRL) matches do have the right to show two minutes of NRL action without penalty and for an unspecified time after the event on their web sites. A full hearing on the case will be held April 27.

Another Rugby Sports Rights Issue Goes To Court - April 12, 2007

The international media should keep an eye on what happens in the Australian Federal Court in Sydney on Friday – Telstra, the communications company that has splurged some A$170 million ($140 million, €111 million) on media rights packages with the Australian Rugby League (ARL) and the Australian Football League (AGFL), is seeking an injunction against Fox Sports from showing two minutes of rugby video on its Internet and mobile phone services after a game ends. Telstra wants that limited to no more than 45 seconds.

It’s another media sports rights battle with Telstra wanting to protect its BigPond Internet service that is full of rugby and football video, and for which it says it has paid a lot of money in license fees.

At issue is the so-called “fair dealing” practice under which two minutes of video have been shown in the past, but that is tradition—it’s not actually written down anywhere that the limit is two minutes.

According to a Telstra spokesman, “Telstra maintains that by making the video highlights available, Fox Sports and News Digital Media are infringing Telstra’s exclusive rights granted under the recent six-year agreement with Telstra negotiated with the NRL. Telstra is determined to protect this significant investment.”