Another beautiful quote from Jerry Maguire:
I am out here for YOU.... You don't know what it's like being ME out here for YOU! It's an up-at-dawn, pride-swallowing sieeeeeeeege that I will NEVER fully tell you about!
It seems the naming rights saga has caught fire among the English FA Premier League . On the back of Newcastle United's announcement that St. James' Park is to be known as the "sportsdirect.com @ St. James' Park", Chelsea's Chief Executive Ron Gourlay has now revealed that Chelsea are preparing to follow the lead by selling the naming rights for Stamford Bridge. Like Ashley and Co. at Newcastle, Gourlay is insisting that the associated brand will only be able to add to the name, rather than actually change the name of the stadium altogether. 'Stamford Bridge' would therefore be retained in the name along with the assocation with "a suitable blue-chip company."
"With the renaming it was always going to be whatever brand it was, at St James' Park. For the remainder of this season, we already have sportsdirect.com on the Gallowgate so we'd like to take that branding through the rest of the stadium."
Derek Llambias, Manging Director
Post your comments below and read more on the debate on BBC Sport's 606 debate
"We are able to show that bringing the game to Australia and having the Asian continent with us at the same time-zone will benefit not only Australia, not only Asia, but the whole football world"
Frank Lowy, Chief of Australia's FIFA World Cup Bid and Australia's Richest Man
Asia comprises the world's fastest growing economies, the fastest growing television and media audiences and the fastest growing consumer markets. Intuitively, Lowy's claim seems to be sensible. But how valid is this regional bias? The three points below try to open this up a bit.
1. The combined audiences for West and East are broadly similar
By looking at FIFA's published TV and Out Of Home (which includes pubs and other public viewing areas) cumulative viewing figures by region we can compare the 2002 World Cup held in Asia with the 2006 World Cup held in Europe.
In terms of the number of viewers, comparing Europe with Asia is hard to swing in Europe's favour. In 2002 there were 2.7 Asian viewers to every European viewer. In 2006 this figure was cut to 1.6 but still, this is a huge difference. However, this only takes into account numbers for Asia and Europe. 'East' and 'West' is much broader.
By grouping together figures for Europe with North America, South America and Central America (EurAm) we get a better idea of what Western audiences actually add up to. We can then compare this with an Eastern group comprised of the Asia and Oceana (APAC). When we look at East vs. West in this hollistic way we get a slightly more even result. In the 2002 World Cup, held in Asia, there were only 1.3 Eastern (APAC) viewers to Western (EurAm) viewers but in the 2006 World Cup there were 1.2 Western viewers to Eastern viewers - despite the fact that the Germany World Cup was broadcast in 11 fewer EurAm territories than the 2002 World Cup. So there wasn't that big a difference after all. The audiences are pretty much similar from East to West. The drop off in audience attributable to changes in time-zones is nearly identical with both regions losing roughly 7% of their audience when the games were shown at more unsociable hours. Let's not forget, though, that with China's population alone being double that of the whole of Europe, Asia's 7% certainly represents more people. This brings us on to our next point - although the audiences are roughly the same, and the drop off is the same, advertisers will look for efficiency over reach and this may present the West with another argument against the Lowry.
2. Rights fees are based on efficiency, not just reach
Lowry also spoke about the revenue that an Australasian World Cup would bring in. He didn't go into specifics in the article I read but someone told me he'd quoted a difference of +$1bn. That's a lot of money and I'm not sure where he gets it from. Despite offering huge reach, there's going to be an awful lot of wastage in a market where the audiences are almost inconceivably large. In EurAm, penetration is much higher with a greater proportion of the total populations watching or experiencing the tournament. I don't want to waste any money speaking to people who aren't in the mood to listen, especially if there's millions of them. Also, because there aren't many national broadcasters in the regions, the scope for competition among those looking to secure broadcast rights is smaller. Coupled with the lack of efficiency, this makes for risky - and tricky - business for those formulating broadcast revenue prediction models. Although, broadcast revenue isn't the only source of income from the tournament.
3. A successful event needs the stadia to be full Although we hate to admit it, everyone secretly loves the English. English football fans, like many of our counterparts, bring with them a fantastic enthusiasm for the game that heralds from decades of disappointment and ecstasy from following the nation's team. World Cup tournaments need these fans. They need them to fill up the stadiums and prevent what happened at some of Beijing's Olympic events where organisers had to give tickets away to locals for free (retail price was very high - around £90 per ticket) in order to fill the seats. In Sydney's Olympic games, kids were actually transported to the venues by buses to fill the venues with the right kind of audience. What's the lesson here? Big TV audiences don't necessarily equate to a success on a national level.We have a little time to go before the decisions for 2018 and 2022 will be made (December 2010) but at the moment, it seems as though the argument isn't as black and white as we may have originally thought. Let's see what FIFA say.You can read more about Lowry's argument here
Picture found here
We've heard of World of Warcraft...
We've heard of Second Life...
They don't have that much in common, but there is a middle ground:
Where the desire for hyper-reality meets the desire to compete... to beat an opponent and win.
Here, the sporting brands will be the real winners.
Empire of Sports proclaims to be the net's most life-like virtual-reality massively multi-player online role-playing game (MMORPG)... Bit of a mouthful but in a nut-shell it gives everyone the opportunity to achieve the sporting heroism the real world has cruelly denied them. Speaking of heroism, it comes as no surprise that the game has teamed up with newly-crowned European Champions, FC Barcelona, to add a touch of true-life gloss to its fledgling format. The relationship is, for the moment, expected. In other words, it doesn't offer many surprises. But this is good reason - above all - to watch this space as it unfolds... (for keen beans I've included some details further down).
The potential reach of a MMORPG is, by definition, huge. Although details of the financial elements of the deal have not been disclosed, it's to be expected that some sort of value-in-kind arrangement has been reached. While EoS's users have an enhanced experience with the added realism and opportunity that a 'partner' like Barça can bring, the club will benefit from being the first such brand woven into the architecture (with the exception of Roland Garros, who are hosting a virtual French Open tournament). Let us not forget that users of games like EoS are much more likely to communicate online than non, much more likely to be receptive to messages from brands within games than non and much more likely to be early adopters, influencers and social media moguls than non (just a hunch). This is a highly targeted, trackable, and ultimately valuable audience - not just to the teams or tournaments, but to the brands associated with those teams and tournaments like Nike or adidas.
Will the game - or world - be successful? The signs are there that it will. Numbers aside, the ingredients are there for triumph. Being specifically designed for sport, EoS comes with no pretense, just pure expectancy. In a few month's time, when the first virtual Ronaldo or Nadal start to emerge from the training programmes, when the users start to reap the real-world rewards from their hours of training and practise (big budget prizes for winning the virtual French Open, or a virtual contract with a virtual version of FC Barcelona competing in the virtual La Liga on course to win the virtual UEFA Champion's League under the stuardship of one of the youngest virtual managers on the virtual circuit at a real age of 10), we will see not just the birth of a new breed of Superstar, but another worthy victory for the sporting brands themselves. Virtual fans require virtual merchandise, and no one likes to buy fakes. It'll be the virtual shop for the virtual flag, to wave in the virtual stadium at the virtual game your friend (who you're chatting to at the same time) is virtually playing in - and all of this is big money. Potentially it's bigger than real world, because logistics go out of the window - no need to worry about how or why or where. It's one location, one platform.
Ladies and gentleman, this is the birth of a behemoth. It may take a while to grow, but mark my words... it's going to be huge.
Further information:
What do Barça offer the game?
The creation of a VIP section within the game interface where users, upon showing the Barça Opening Contest (see below) to a guy called 'Sergi' who'll be hanging around the Central Plaza, you can enter competitions to win exclusive merchandise and certain in-game privileges. So what?
What are people saying about it?
FC Barcelona president Joan Laporta. "The idea of having a FC Barça virtual club house in an online world dedicated to sport is mind blowing. It takes our motto ‘more than a club’ to a whole new level – and we hope that our presence in Empire of Sports will continue to increase the level of support for both FC Barcelona and football."
Alexis Galley, chief executive of Empire of Sports, said: "We couldn’t ask for a more prestigious partner than FC Barcelona. We are really proud to welcome them into our virtual world of sport and give them the space to work closely with their fans and supporters. Empire of Sports has limitless potential and offers amazing opportunities to our ever-growing list of partners– the fact that worldwide brands such as FC Barcelona see this opportunity, only serves to strengthen our confidence in making the first worldwide sports-based gaming platform."
Quote from EoS
The site reads:
"From Wednesday, May 27th you will be able to visit the FC Barcelona Clubhouse to get special items and information about this prestigious club!
And to celebrate this occasion a special event will take place! You will have until Sunday, June 14th to surpass yourself in official competitions and gain as much football ranking points as you can. Each day your progression will be saved and at the end of those three weeks a day will be randomly chosen. The player who made the best ranking progression this day will win a genuine FC Barcelona jersey signed by the star player Lionel Messi!"
For more information, visit Empire of Sports here 
