NFL Commissioner on Phone
The (Super Bowl) party’s over | IndyStar.com — Can you believe how out-of-control the copyright situation has become? And can you believe these greedy NFL jerkoffs? This is one of the most disgusting stories I’ve ever heard. Instead of letting the Super Bowl be a social event people have to, by law, watch it alone according to Aiello and the NFL bosses. Write your Congressman have the copyright laws changed and break up the NFL while they are at it.
Churches in Indiana and across the country are scrapping traditional Super Bowl viewing parties in wake of the NFL’s stance that mass viewings of the game on big screen TV’s would violate copyright law.
The issue came to light Thursday when the Star reported that the NFL had told Fall Creek Baptist Church in Indianapolis that its plans for a Super Bowl watch party in front a big screen TV would be illegal.
NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said Thursday the league stands by its interpretation of copyright law and would look into any violators that comes to the league’s attention. The main concern for the league, Aiello said, is groups that charge admission to watch games and those that use a TV screen larger than 55 inches to show the game.
A story about Fall Creek’s plan to cancel its game viewing plans prompted dozens of calls and more than 500 email comments to the Star’s website Thursday. Aiello said media from around the country have been inquiring with the league as well.
In Indianapolis, home of the AFC Champion Colts, Indian Creek Christian Church and Castleton United Methodist Church are among those who have cancelled plans to watch the game in their churches.
Greg Aiello to little girls: “If your parents have a screen larger than 55 inches and friends come over to watch the game, let me know and we’ll put them in jail.”
found by Mr. Justin
#35 I agree with this. This is just a set up to gouge the public more than they do already. By setting up this enforcement early and setting a precedent they can stave off these churches from putting the PPV up on the big screen when it comes to that. This is all about precedent so nobody can complain later. This also makes sense with the 55-inch limitation. With PPV they will not want a huge group even gathering at your house to watch since it will hurt PPV revenues.
#40 — this is a statistical analysis by Nielsen.. not absolute and it seems unlikely that out of any 500 churchgoers even one person would be a Nielsen person and that person would probably keeps a Nielsen diary that accounts for such viewing. I can assure you that this is not the reason.
The more interesting question to me is, “What does the NFL expect to GAIN by their action?”
Force everyone to watch the game at the stadium? Nope, can’t get in. It’s sold out.
Force everyone to pay them a royalty? Maybe, but I didn’t see any demand for payment made to presenters.
Keep non-beer drinkers from watching together? Could be, but what about the Catholics, who are not known as teetotalers?
In the old spirit of “follow the money”, where EXACTLY is the money that drives this issue?
#42 see #35 — it’s just thinking ahead…
Arguing that you can’t get a ticket is specious. You can *always* get a ticket…if you have enough money. Personally, I couldn’t justify even list price of a Super Bowl ticket and frankly, having been to a few stadiums that have hosted Super Bowls, I’d be damn upset if I blew four to five (or more) figures on one of those crappy seats with swill beer where I can’t TIVO replays at my hearts content.
I would bet that while the Nielsen argument is at the root of this policy, enforcement is geared towards PPV. To me, it seems ridiculous that you can force copyright restrictions on something that you are giving away for free. I’m having a Life-of-Brian flashback.
“Four for this gourd? Four!!!! Look at it, that’s worth ten if it’s worth a shekel.”
“But you just gave it to me for nothing.”
“Yes, but it’s worth ten.”
My first reaction is if a church is a sacred place to worship God why are they watching football in Church. Now to my point, the reason the NFL doesn’t want Church or Movie theater showings is because the NFL’s biggest sponsors don’t want it. You can’t drink beer in these venues! The NFL does what its sponsors want. Trust me on this one.
#45 asked: “…if a church is a sacred place to worship God why are they watching football in Church.”
To look how to get their comunity closer? To see if they can win back those that say church is boring?
Actually this story has been updated. I was exactly right. Everyone who disagreed with me was nearly totally wrong.
Further more, I was correct about the nefarious goals of the churches. It seems the churches use this as an important ‘fund raising’ effort, and the half time show is a proselytizing effort.
This whole news cycle was about the war mongering christian fundamentals efforts to influence and takeover the NFL. It is eerily similar to the way these same groups have taken over high school football, and made them church proselytizing efforts.
If you guys want to continue to be free, it is time to take the kid gloves off when dealing with these talibanesque groups.
#47, Greg, thank you for the update.
I don’t think the NFL would be able to sue any church for showing the game. If the broadcast is “over the air” then it is free. It may not be copied or rebroadcast but you can’t stop anyone from catching your signal. That is the price of using the public’s airwaves to show your broadcast.
Cable broadcasts are different though. They can, and do, put limitations on viewers. That would include Applebee’s which use ESPN.
As others have alluded, this is just a bully boy tactic.
I would agree that a big part of the NFL’s problem with many people watching the game in one place is that the ratings would go down because less people would be at home even though the same number people are really watching the game in groups.