LONDON SUMMER OLYMPICS: New restrictions being implemented, but how the policies are enforced raises many unanswered questions

The 70,000 volunteers for the 2012 London Summer Olympics will have to think twice about what they upload to Facebook, tweet or blog. They have essentially been “hushed” from discussing certain topics in certain ways by the International Olympic Committee (“IOC”) throughout the Olympic Games.

The IOC has come a long way to lighten up on its restrictions on the use of social media over the years. But some are still outraged by them. The reasons behind the restrictions include security, athlete privacy and of course, trying to maximize revenue from traditional broadcast rights.

Participants have not been told to completely disconnect from social media, as some bloggers have suggested. But the IOC has essentially tried to prevent users of social media from acting as journalists.

The IOC says participants are allowed and “encouraged” to use social media tools. However, they are also explicitly told “any such postings, blogs or tweets must be in a first-person, diary-type format and should not be in the role of a journalist.” The IOC explains this means any blogs and tweets “must not report on competition or comment on the activities of other participants or accredited persons, or disclose any information which is confidential or private in relation to any other person or organization.”

Participants are not banned from taking pictures or videos. In fact, still pictures can be posted on Facebook. The only restriction is that participants are “not permitted to commercialize, sell or otherwise distribute these photographs.”

Understandably, the rules regarding the residential area of the Olympic Village are a little more stringent because of the protected environment those staying there are promised. For example, before any pictures can be uploaded, the prior consent of the people in the picture must be obtained. Any videos taken in the residential area must be for personal use and cannot be uploaded.

The IOC Guidelines go on for four pages and discuss topics such as “Olympic Marks,” “Advertising and Sponsorship,” “Domain Names,” “Website Links,” “Liability” and how the rules will be monitored and what might happen if a participant Infringes the rules.

The London Olympics Organizing Committee recently released its rules which are a bit more stringent. A list of the rules taken from the policy’s “what to do and what not to do” warns volunteers not to:

Disclose their location; Post a picture or video of backstage areas closed to the public; Disclose breaking news about an athlete; Tell their social network about any athlete or celebrity; or Get involved in detailed discussion about the games online.

However, participants are allowed to retweet official London 2012 postings and otherwise relay official information releases.

Clearly, there will be issues with respect to enforcing these policies. Does disclosing your location include “Having lunch at the Village?” What is “detailed discussion?” While restrictions relating to security and privacy are understandable, one has to wonder what the point is in preventing someone from tweeting “X just won the 100 meter dash?”

That’s not surprising given the nature of the restrictions.  For more details about those restrictions, see some of my earlier comments.

The latest example is Vanoc (aka the Vancouver Olympics).  Seems that there are a couple of instances where Vanoc has been accused of trying to acquire rights from others that crossed the line.

See the details on Excess Copyright or Techdirt.

Witness this post on boing boing, reporting that the IOC has sent a takedown notice to someone who posted a photo on flickr of the exterior of the Beijing water cube.

The commenter states:  I hope that the IOC is aware that it’s about to show up in one of the most media-savvy towns in the world, and that trying to stop private citizens from posting “unauthorized” photos will be nothing short of a fool’s errand.

Canadians and the Canadian government have been critical of the new, tougher US border policies.   Perhaps another instance where the risk/reward of security procedures is out of whack – and where security theatre has trumped the actual need.

That’s the title of my Free Press article for this week. It talks about the new IOC rules for athlete blogging for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. In essence, the IOC has amended its rules to allow limited blogging, and have taken the position that bloggers are not journalists. In essence, they don’t want them to be journalists, as that might run counter to the rights they sell to traditional media outlets.

In checking Slaw this morning to see if anyone else has mentioned this subject, I noticed Connie Crosby’s post from last summer about athlete blogging. She pointed out that several Canadian athletes blogged as part of the CBC’s site. That’s actually an interesting compromise. Presumably those athletes could do that without the IOC restrictions because they are doing so as part of accredited media. So to some extent the blogging athlete and the media outlet get the best of both worlds.
Read my article on my blog, on the Free Press site, or on the Canoe tech page

Read this on Canoe

The International Olympic committee (IOC) recently announced its athlete blogging rules for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.

There are still restrictions, but they are more flexible than those for the 2008 Beijing Games, which was the first time athletes could blog about their experiences.

That decision was made by the IOC only a few weeks before the games, and it wasn’t something they particularly wanted to do. Rather, a number of athletes publically stated that they planned on blogging no matter what the official policy was. In response, the IOC quickly put together rules to control what athletes could and could not put in their blogs.

For the Vancouver Games, the IOC had more time to decide how to handle blogging. Athletes are not allowed to display the official Olympic symbol on their blogs –the well-known, five interlocking rings. Athletes can’t display the official mascot of the games. And don’t expect to see any images or videos of the action, either — those are banned under the rules.

The IOC has stated that it “considers blogging . . . as a legitimate form of personal expression and not as a form of journalism.” This position was no doubt taken in an attempt to not upset the media companies that pay so much money for exclusive rights.

But, truth be told, bloggers are quickly becoming the new age journalist. Some bloggers have found themselves with journalistic credentials to cover events.

Traditional media may be in knots over the impact of Olympic athlete blogs — many people may prefer to hear about the Olympic experience from the perspective of the athletes themselves, rather than through a media filter.

The IOC has been very restrictive about what can and can’t be put on a blog. In addition to banning mascots, symbols, or emblems, bloggers have to be careful where they even use the word “Olympic.” They can’t use the word in any way that would make a reader think the blog is trying to piggy back a product on the Olympic name. There are also restrictions on how athletes can describe games action.

It looks like the IOC is trying to embrace the Internet audience, without giving up too much control over how the games are reported.

One challenge is that the Olympics are only held every two years, and in that time, the Internet dramatically changes the way we view everything in the world, including sporting events.

Despite the restrictions, the IOC’s decision to let athleted blog is a victory for Internet fans — as if the IOC had a choice. Olympic blogging provides a view into the life of athletes that traditional journalists just can’t deliver.

In the end, despite restrictions that some find unreasonable, the IOC may have reached a compromise that will keep everyone basically satisfied for now.

We’ve decided to commission research into how developments in public surveillance techniques and technology are affecting Canadians, individually and as a society. First off, Queen’s University will be examining the proliferation of surveillance cameras across the country, and report on the trends in the use of public surveillance – although it seems as if we are seeing more and more attempts to expand surveillance networks. As well, the University of Alberta will be taking a detailed look at whether privacy issues are being properly considered in the run-up to the 2010 Olympics.

I look forward to the results of that research.  I subscribe to the view that for the most part public CCTV is security theatre that does not have any significant effect on actual security.

Read the Comissioner’s post for more detail and insight into the issue.

Of course this raises issues about privacy and just what will be done with all that information, and its questionable whether those measures will have any effect on that goal.

A great example of security theatre – somehow not surprising when it goes along with the theatrics of the opening and closing ceremonies.

Read more on Slashdot

The IOC has just released its rules on what athletes can and can not do on their blogs. Techdirt sums it up by saying: First Rule: No Blogging Anything Interesting

Frankly, watching Olympic events is not a zero sum game. How many of us have the time or inclination to watch hours of TV every day during the Olympics? If people turn to websites or blogs to get their Olympic news or watch a winning performance in a sport they are interested in, it doesn’t have to mean that TV viewing/revenue will drop.

Read the Techdirt post for the details