2010 Olympics: The influence of advertising on quality broadcast journalism

Imagine yourself as Linsey Vonn yesterday – a native of Saint Paul, Minnesota, who has been working her whole life, since she was 2 years old, to bring home an Olympic gold in women’s downhill skiing.

She finally does it, gives hugs to her family in the stands, and picks up a cell phone to call some close friends from home.

Only one thing – nobody wants to answer the phone. Not because they’re not interested, but because nobody has seen it yet. NBC wouldn’t be airing her performance until later that night, on primetime television, when more people were watching.

This post is about power.

We all know – money is a big driver of power. Unfortunately for all of us, nowhere is this more apparent than NBC’s broadcast coverage of the 2010 Olympics.

What do I mean? Well, advertising money, more-so than monumental athletic performances, are influencing NBC’s broadcast decisions during the 2010 Olympics.

NBC is infuriating millions of fans by tape-delaying important events. People online are freaking out, and media publications are picking up on it. Need examples? Read this article by Henry Blodget of Business Insider or today’s piece by Sports Illustrated, or yesterday’s piece in the New York Times.

NBC infuriated millions of “people like me” when they tape-delayed one of America’s treasures – quite possibly the most-discussed performance about a female athlete (ever) – the women’s downhill (i.e., “The Lindsay Vonn Show”).

Crazy, right?

Yesterday, when Vonn performed, I sent around the NYTimes alert saying Vonn had won the gold with the message “yay!” One of my WomenTalkSports friends was a little annoyed that I had ruined the surprise. She apparently was waiting in anticipation to watch in on TV later that night.

While I understand where she’s coming from, that’s not the world that I live in. I don’t “wait” for things anymore. I demand access to real-time updates and breaking news stories because that’s what I deserve as a consumer. And that’s exactly what NBC should be broadcasting.

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Hannah Kearney brings home USA’s first Olympic Gold in moguls

If you didn’t see it last night, you missed a great performance.

No, I’m not talking about Apolo Ohno, who (luckily) snagged a silver in the men’s speedskating short track competition.

I’m talking about Hannah Kearney, the Olympic mogul skier from Hanover, New Hampshire, who beat the pants off of her competitors and brought home the United States’ first gold medal at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. (NBC coverage is located here in case you missed it)

Kearney entered the 2010 Olympics with the lead qualifying score, 25.96. Kearney skied what NBC commentators called “textbook skiing,” or a very clean run, earning a score of 26.63 and winning the gold medal. The run pushed Canadian opponent Jennifer Heil to silver, and USA teammate Shannon Bahrke to bronze.

If you aren’t familiar with moguls skiing (don’t worry, I’m not either), here’s a little background:

- moguls are are a series of bumps on a trail formed when skiers push the snow into mounds or piles as they execute short-radius turns.

- competitors are scored in three different ways: turns score, air score, and speed score. The combined score is based upon all three areas – whoever has the highest score wins.

- During a competition run, contestants must navigate around the moguls and execute tricks. Some common tricks include: 360 X, twister, spread, Daffy, cork-720, and backflip.

Watch this video to see a little background on Heather:

A conversation: Tucker Center, Twitter and women’s sports (Part 5)

 

This blog post is part 5 of a series dicussing my experiences with social media as they relate to  advocacy issues that highly affect the women’s sport sphere. This is an assignment for a class I’m enrolled in as part of John’s Hopkins University’s Digital Communications program.

Hands down, the coolest experience I had online this week had to do with Twitter. I participated in the Tucker Center’s Distinguished Lecture Series titled, “Facing Off Over Facebook: The Impact of Social Media on Women Sports.” This lecture was indeed the first of its kind, and I’d like to congratulate the event’s coordinator Nicole Lavoi (WomenTalkSports blogger) and Marie Hardin (featured speaker, also WomenTalkSports blogger) in a job well-done.

Though I didn’t 100 percent agree with everything that was said during the lecture, I loved it, primarily for two key reasons.

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The Argument: A change in communication for female athletes

 

This blog post is part of my ongoing weekly series discussing the role of social media and female athletics. My latest reading is 

The Argument: Inside the battole to remake Democratic politics by Matt Bai.

Let me start out this blog post with a quote from Bai, “Great political movements need more than a bunch of shared principles; they need an argument.” That’s exactly what this book is about: a new argument for the Democratic party.

Really, it’s the story of many arguments toward one strategy, arguments that started in 2004 when Kerry lost the election to Bush and continued all the way up to the 2008 Democratic Presidental Campaign. This book is about  a struggle for control for the Thing that would cure the Democratic party: a new Democratic communications landscape, or, rather, a centralized message.

In my opinion, the coolest part of the book was the story of the PowerPoint, developed by Rob Stein of The Phoenix Group that essentially circulated its way through the “underground” of  influential Democrats in the post-Kerry era. (see chapter 2 – “The Killer Slideshow”) The PowerPoint contained an idea – one developed through studying “the conservative message machine” that was winning elections and taking editorial control over key issues in political messaging.

In my opinion, the PowerPoint to which Bai refers represented more than just an outline of what conservatives were doing right: it represented what Democrats were doing wrong – they weren’t communicating effectively enough. The Thing they needed to do was talk, and with the help of social media, that’s exactly what happened over the course of four years. 

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Facebook, Myspace, Twitter and sports advocacy (Part 3)

This blog post is part 3 of a series dicussing my experiences with Facebook, Myspace and Twitter as they relate to  advocacy issues that highly affect the women’s sport sphere. This is an assignment for a class I’m enrolled in as part of John’s Hopkins University’s Digital Communications program.

This week, I took an active approach to my activities with sports advocacy in Facebook, Myspace and Twitter.

Facebook
As an admin of the WomenTalkSports Fan Page on Facebook, I posted about the National Women’s Law Center’s publication on understanding the basics of Title IX. I asked the community what they thought of the publication, and if they know any other good ones. Though I didn’t recieve a response,  Melissa Stein Nodvin, one of our fans, gave me the thumbs up.

It’s also important to note a few groups that I found when searching for Title IX on Facebook. Because I don’t actively support these groups, I”m not going to link to them. However, if you do the search yourself, you’ll see what I’m talking about. It’s important that female athletes have active groups discussing and defending Title IX-related issues. Our opposition certainly does.

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Google adds sports calendars

If you have a Google account, chances are pretty good that at some point, at the top of your browser, you saw this:

 

Here’s what it means: Google supplies public calendars to overlay ontop of yours. Recently, they added sports calendars by partnering with Yahoo to do so. 

I think this is the coolest thing!

Pretty nice that they’ve got women’s basketball and soccer up there. (Soccer is wayyyy at the bottom of that scroll bar). Where are all the other women’s sports?

womentalksports.com has a calendar of all women’s sports events (as far as I know, it’s one of a  kind) We’ve got a more interactive version coming soon, so stay tuned!

Saying goodbye to a friend and mentor, Adam Jacobs

Today, I want to say a final goodbye to a friend and mentor, Adam Jacobs. Adam was the Editor-in-Chief of TheFinalSprint.com and CEO of the TFS Media Network. Just a few days ago, I received word from his mother that Adam passed away on May 22, 2009.

For those of you who don’t know him, Adam was the mastermind behind an athletics blog network that consisted of his own running blog, TheFinalSprint.com, a women’s health Web site, HerActiveLife.com, a men’s health Web site called HesFit.com, and an outdoor Web site called TrailFit.com.

I met Adam during my junior year of college (2006). I was looking for an internship experience on CareerBuilder.com and saw an ad for a writer on TheFinalSprint.com. I applied for the job and later that day received a phone call from Adam offering me a spot as a featured writer. That phone conversation lasted for over an hour. Adam certainly didn’t hold back – he wanted to know all about me, why I loved sports and what my career goals were.

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White House Roundtable Celebrates Title IX’s 37th Anniversary

Today, the Women’s Sports Foundation represents the female athletes of the United States in a celebration of the anniversary of Title IX by visiting the White House for a special roundtable discussion.

“At 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, June 23, the White House will be holding a 37th anniversary of Title IX roundtable featuring Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett, Education Secretary Duncan, Foundation founder Billie Jean King, first Foundation President Donna deVarona, former Foundation President Dominique Dawes, current President Jessica Mendoza, Foundation Government Liaison and former Trustee Lillian Greene-Chamberlain, Ph.D and CEO Karen Durkin.”

You can watch the roundtable at 2:30pm EST here. Also, the White House’s Facebook application will be streaming to the roundable live, here, where you can participate by adding to the chat.

To convey the message even further, check out the below video… which is….  frankly – awesome. I highly encourage other female sports bloggers to post this on their blogs as well today.

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Dads: Important role models for female athletes

While I know that not all female athletes have fathers (nor do they need them to be successful), I find it important on this Father’s Day to recognize the positive impact dads can have on the female athlete experience.

First, it’s important to point out that men make up the majority of female athlete coaches. While I understand the Women’s Sports Foundation’s POV on this issue continues to (rightfully) focus upon the lack of women in the profession (which is a problem), I also believe it’s important to talk about the men who do coach girls. Often times, these men are dads: supportive role models who have a vested interest in a woman’s future as an athlete.

Take, for instance, fathers like Richard Williams, the father of Serena and Venus, two of the most well-known tennis players in the world. Serena and Venus’ careers started on the Compton public tennis courts, where her father encouraged their development.

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5 reasons female athletes should engage online

If you’re a female athlete (or you represent female athletes), I have provided five key reasons you should get online and start talking about your life, your sport, and maybe even your brand.

1) You’re creating and controlling your own voice. Today, athletes can no longer rely on traditional media to cover their stories and extend their brands. Instead, I’m afraid you have to do it on your  own, ladies. Some of you are doing it really, really well. Even when you  get cut.

Take for instance Chantelle Anderson who tried out for the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream and got cut. She, prior to getting cut, not only created a name for herself by blogging on Yardbarker, but also continues to voice her opinions about the situation  to a huge audience of followers. Personally (and I know this is not right) but I think the Dream should have kept her, in addition to her talent, she has a following that (maybe) could have transitioned into ticket sales and increased attention, something the struggling league desparately needs.

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This. Is. Cool…. Online community comes together, demanding fair pay for women

I wanted to share the list of blogs which collectively came together (with the help of the National Women’s Law Center) to discuss and demand fair pay for women.

The list continues to grow. It’s so great to see women coming together for a common cause to actually discuss and create conversations about an advocacy cause that we all collectively support.

Take a look at this list (be sure to click “more” – this is huge). Also, notice the Twitter widget, below – they’re following all conversations with the hashtag #fairplay.

9to5 National Blog

A Blog of Our Own
AAUW CA Online Branch Forum
AAUW Dialog – Lecia Imbery
AAUW Dialog – Linda Brodsky
AAUW-WA Public Policy
About.com: Working Moms

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Videos from my first WNBA Draft

Over the next two days, Sarah from Blogher and Draft Day Suit will video blogging with me during our journey to the WNBA Draft. Tune in for more. Looking forward to this!

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