Robert Carter: SEC media restrictions are a sign of things to come

So there is much hue and cry and weeping and cussing over the new restrictions on the press that have been handed down by the Southeastern Conference.

The new rules boil down to two simple concepts: money and power.

The money comes from folks like CBS and ESPN and others who broadcast SEC games, and pay vast sums of moolah for the right to do so. Those companies want to make sure their investments are protected by virtue of a certain amount of exclusivity. In other words, they don't someone else giving away for free what they’re paying a lot of bucks for.

The power comes from the new SEC Digital Network, and how the conference can now control more aspects of the performances — and don’t kid yourself, athletic contests are performances — of its athletes.

In other words, the SEC is no longer dependent on the television networks, radio, or newspapers to bring the action to the fans. With the advent of the Internet, they can do more and more of it themselves.

Let the ink-stained wretches find another press box from which to mooch free hot dogs. Let the preening TV guys stand outside the stadium. The conference has the rights to all games of its member schools, if the plan unfolds. No middleman to worry about — and no watchdog to call someone out if there are issues.

But don’t feel sorry for us reprobate reporters. The restrictions are even greater on you, the paying fan.

Here’s the new policy for spectators, verbatim: You may not “produce or disseminate (or aid in producing or disseminating) any material or information about the Event, including, but not limited to, any account, description, picture, video, audio, reproduction or other information concerning the Event.”

Carried to its extreme, that means you can’t tell your buddy about the game afterward. You can’t take pictures or video with a camera or cell phone. You can’t blog from your IPhone.

Of course, the conference says it’s not about that. They just don’t want someone sending a live video stream out from their camera that would compete against the TV or cable broadcast. That may seem farfetched, but thanks to advances in technology, it isn’t. Relatively inexpensive cameras can now shoot in HD, and a decent high-speed mobile Internet connection can send it to a website. Never mind that it would be a single camera, hand held by a single fan from what probably isn’t the best angle. It still is a threat to the broadcasters, which is in turn a threat to the conference treasury.

So the SEC did what all good institutions do in such a case. They panicked, and went into overkill. Their restrictions were overly broad in the extreme, and seemed to clamp down on professional media to an extent never seen before by any sports organization.

Never mind that the restrictions on everyday fans are virtually unenforceable, mainly because the technology isn’t there to do it and neither is the manpower. Can you imagine the class for ushers and stadium security on “How To Nab Those Pesky Bloggers”?

The memo from my own parent company, Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc., was direct and to the point: Don’t sign an agreement to these restrictions, even if it means you won’t be get credentials.

This week the conference backed off a little bit, after the Associated Press and other media groups threatened legal action. The limits on how much a reporter could blog during a game were eased. No more limits on whether a newspaper could use photos to do an end-of-season section or book, or a television station to do a post-season special.

But situations like this are going to become more commonplace as time goes on. As the technology becomes more available to everyone, the organizations who sell rights to sports events will become much more paranoid. They see their exclusivity slipping away, along with the cash that goes with it. Weaning those university athletic programs away from all those network dollars is not a prospect that Mike Slive, nor any other conference commissioner, wants to face.

After all, we have a guy hosting a daily live sports-talk television show from the living room of his double-wide manufactured home in Warrior. His equipment outlay is probably in the neighborhood of $3,000 or so for two cameras, a computer, software and a high-speed Internet connection.

It may sound like the sports version of “Wayne’s World,” but it’s here, right now. For that matter, I can set up a studio with three HD cameras, computerized production and more for less than 20 grand. Maybe even way less.

So get used to it. Conferences and professional leagues are going to protect their immense investments, as well as the revenue flow from broadcast rights holders. You think they’re going to let that slip away because of a legion of bloggers and video nerds?

No way.

Robert Carter is the sports editor of The North Jefferson News.

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