The SEC Trying To Restrict Media Coverage

by srr50 on Aug 13, 2009 4:44 PM CDT

...or at least restrict those who aren't paying them for the privilege. The Southeastern Conference announced new rules that would restrict media outlets in terms of use of video, audio, photographs and digital descriptions of any and all SEC events, from games to practices and press conferences.

After hearing from just about every media outlet outside of their TV partners ESPN and CBS, the SEC has indicated that maybe they were a little quick to cut off that much access to the press.

Essentially the SEC media policy is to protect their broadcast partners as well as XOS Technologies, which is getting ready to unveil the SEC Digital Network.

Earlier this spring, when Tennessee's Lane Kiffin accused Florida's Urban Meyer of cheating in recruiting, a fan captured it and posted it on the internet. The SEC would like to make sure that doesn't happen again.

The media policy is designed to drive fan traffic to the SEC schools' websites -- which are about to become a revenue stream for the schools. Each of the websites will have some video that can be accessed for free, but will also have "insider" video that will be seen at a price.

The SEC wants to restrict TV stations from showing any game highlights after 72 hours from the conclusion of the contest. It also forbids the news media from posting practice and news conference video online. It also states at in order to receive a credential to cover an SEC event, the media must sign an agreement to these terms.

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If the Big 12 had the SEC media restrictions, no local station would allowed to show highlights from previous games.

The SEC says the intent of the policy was to protect the schools' web sites so certain video could only be seen there. But the restrictions, as currently written are so Draconian, that it makes you wonder if they even bothered to have a lawyer take a look at the policy.

For instance I assume that the 72-hour on game highlights is to keep them off of YouTube, but say a local TV station was putting together a pre-season show, or a special during the season. Or they even wanted to use some highlights as "B-Roll" to cover a player interview. Under the SEC rules, they would be forbidden from doing so after the 72-hour window.

In addition to game coverage, the new media policy also covers pre-and post-game press conferences, practices or any other "event sponsored or hosted by the Southeastern Conference or by any one or more of its member institutions."

That covers a helluva lot of ground, and should keep media lawyers happy for quite a while in SEC country.

Obviously there is precedent to protect restrictions on live game content. And BTW the new rules also say if you are a fan at an SEC contest and you twitter, or blog, or even take a photo and put it on your Facebook page, you can be punished. The personal digital restrictions seem especially silly since those strictly supplement coverage. I find it hard to believe that the number of people who are not at the game, and are not watching it on TV but are following via twitter is a number to be concerned about.

Obviously most of the in-stadium stuff is unenforceable, so fans can probably twitter away without fear of reprisal. But the video and audio restrictions will bring real hardships to all of the local media who have been at the heart of the popularity of the SEC over the years.

But who cares about them anyway? I mean it's not like they are contributing anything to the $2.5 Billion the SEC will collect over the next 15 years from the national media outlets.

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Comments

nothing to see here…move along

by mike slive on Aug 13, 2009 5:40 PM CDT reply actions

The 72-hour thing will be DOA the first time a lawyer throws First Amendment fair-use at ’em.

by BEHorn on Aug 13, 2009 5:48 PM CDT reply actions

One of the first things my contracts professor taught us is that lawyers frequently write terms into contracts that they know up front will not stand any sort of legal scrutiny. Why? Because you’d be amazed at the things people will believe are true when a lawyer writes them into a contract.

by NateHeupel on Aug 13, 2009 6:03 PM CDT reply actions

Nate, your contracts prof. was probably not supposed to tell you one of the tricks of the trade. That was very unprofessional of him. And you were probably not suppose to repeat that little nugget here. That was unprofessional of you. Hot damn, what the hell are professionals coming to these days. You know, if professionals keep giving away a their little nuggets for free like this, pretty soon there is going to be no such thing as a professional. Just letting you know, in case you too wish one day to end up becoming a professional professional.

When you are the hot chick in the room, well, you can be a real big bitch and get away with it. That will give you an idea of the true value of personality, no matter what melodramatic blabber a guy might write on the Valentine’s day card. Right now, the SEC is such a hot commodity that they can dick everyone around and no one is gonna care. All anyone cares about is the 3 MNC in the row. Who would not want to be a part of a winning tradition like this?

The SEC has always had a degree of raw talent advantage due to their location, but due to their carelessness and backwardness, they never fully took advantage of this edge until recently. Maybe a few graduates from Harvard and Princeton fairly recently moved into that geographic region and introduced their uppity, intelligent DNA into the southeastern hick gene pool. Who knows? Anyway, it’s only been recently that the SEC has learned to be professional about harnessing this potential and using it as momentum to increase this advantage exponentially, leaving all the other conferences in its dust.

Just goes to show you: you throw enough money at an inbred, toothless, backwater, Arkie hick, and eventually even Jethro will end up turning into another cookie cutter professional. Just refer to Jerry Jones as proof of this. May take a bit longer but it will eventually happen. Just goes to show you: the one key, universal ingredient to being a professional is just one thing: money and the pursuit of more money. You may need some blood, tissue, and a few other collateral ingredients, but the key one will always be money and the likelihood of making more money. Hell, it’s enough to even turn Dumbo the elephant into a suit and tie wearing, clean shaven, modern professional.

by 3 MNC in a row on Aug 13, 2009 10:24 PM CDT reply actions