Businesses To Be Censored on Use of Olympics 520
pitpe writes "The BBC reports that the proposed London 2012 Olympics Bill bans the use of words related to the Olympics by non-sponsors, including 'Olympic', '2012', 'gold', 'summer' and 'games', amongst others. The bill is aimed at
ensuring corporate sponsors, who have provided £790m of the IOC's £2.25bn marketing revenue over the last four years, will not be deterred by 'ambush marketing' where rivals to the official sponsors try to take advantage, but businesses warn it could make it technically illegal for pubs to use chalkboards to flag up coverage of the Games." From the article: "The London 2012 website has already posted a warning listing a string of Olympic-related words and images that are off limits to all but official sponsors. And advertisers' representatives have criticised the new Olympics bill because they believe it will make it almost impossible for most companies to even acknowledge that the Games are happening without getting into trouble. "
news reporting (Score:4, Insightful)
Right (Score:5, Insightful)
I can see it now
Tom: "Hey, I can't wait till the summer of 2012 becau--"
Trademark Police: "Stop right there, infringer!"
Tom: "I didn't do anything wrong!"
Trademark Police: "According to this law you did. Those words are trademarked."
Tom: "How the hell did they trademark a year and a season?!"
Pitiful
This is nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)
Think about it. If you're Coca-Cola (or some other huge multinational) that's spending 8-9 figures to be the "official whatever of the Olympics", you're going to want to be pretty sure that your competitor isn't going to just say the same thing unofficially. Pretty sure in this case means contractual language with teeth. Hence, the IOC turning around and doing the same thing.
Already in the US (Score:5, Insightful)
Atlanta1996 (Score:3, Insightful)
So, what else is new? (Score:3, Insightful)
An ungodly heap of money trumps your rights.
An ungodly heap of money trumps common sense.
Come to thing of it,
an ungodly heap of money trumps everything.
Why are you so surprised?
I have an idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe we can start a new trend of just selling our human rights for profit! Because right now they're just being stolen.
Re:Banning the use of the year? (Score:5, Insightful)
No kidding.
Other banned words include games, medals, gold, silver, bronze, 2012, sponsor, summer
I guess a jewelry store owner would be forbidden from advertising: "Come and see our great selection of gold and silver on sale this starting this summer. No payments until 2012."
This is positively ridiculous.
I, for on, am all in favor of this. (Score:5, Insightful)
Good. It's time to kill of the olympics.
A event like this only means something when the organization running it isn't corrupt from top to bottom. They have the nerve to tell ticket holders that "You can't drink Dr. Pepper here, but you can buy a $20 can of Coke! Coke is it!". The "Olympic Village" is now corporate-sponsored Sodom and Gomorrah. Home improvement companies spend millions on advertisements to say that they are proud to support their olympians ("You've got no marketable skills outside of athletics, so as long as you work 9-to-5 for minimum wage, we've got your back!").... I'm absolutley not surprised to see London sell themselves out by grabbing the Olympic bid.
Now, if nobody CAN mention the Olympics, perhaps they'll just go away. We'll all be better off for it.
Re:Commercialization blows (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Powerwalking-finals.torrent (Score:3, Insightful)
I've always loved the Olympics, I remember looking forward to them even as a child, but this type of crap is quickly making me lose all interest in them. I used to tape what aired while I was at work (or school in the past) so I could watch all the coverage, last Olympics I didn't tape a thing. I didn't watch as much either and the whole Death Grip on Advertising (tm) wasn't quite as bad as this sounds.
So congrats to the IOC and their over-zealous "official" sponsors. It's not just anyone that can completely destroy something as special as the Olympics once were. Oh and just a tip for those official sponsors -- I don't tend to buy products from companies who encourage this type of behaivor, even if you are supporting the Olympics, so you might want to rethink your marketing strategies.
"You can"? (Score:1, Insightful)
You can support the 2012 Games by...
A more accurate way of putting it would be "You are legally obliged to support the 2012 Games by...".
Re:Yeah, and a band too... (Score:1, Insightful)
I dont watch or pay any attention to the olympics whatsoever. Fuck them.
So where are the free games? Because its inevitable...
I also have a special needs child. I wonder if the special olympics are soo idiotic!?
Re:Advertise this (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:news reporting (Score:5, Insightful)
Some athletes ran into pretty big troubles from blogging and posting their own videos during the last olympic "games". The big media went pretty far out of their way to clamp down on everything and it really sucks. Almost every event is locked down with regional exclusivity deals.
If you go to the games, any written, photographic, audio and video content you may acquire must be for your own exclusive use only or you risk having the media lawyers on your back.
My guess is that this will only get much worse before some sense is knocked back in this messy circus act.
Re:Nothing new in the US either (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:UK Govt Introduces Reserved Olympic Letter Law (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:UK Govt Introduces Reserved Olympic Letter Law (Score:2, Insightful)
It's called the golden rule.. (Score:5, Insightful)
BTW, At current exchange rates, this rule was bought at a price of 108 standard tons of gold. I was hoping to see how many Libraries of Congress that would fill, but that's only 181 cu. ft. Kinda disappointing really.
The Brits have a well established solution.... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Advertise this (Score:4, Insightful)
As business (like indivuals) are required by law to pay the council tax, they WILL have contributed money to the games. Admitteditly £'s (pounds) not $'s (dollars).
From many sites "The government has said that, initially, £1.5 billion will come from the National Lottery and up to £550 million from London council tax."
Re:I have an idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
The saddest part of this is that the modern Olympics were supposed to be a showcase for amateur athletics, and a global moment of peace and understanding, not something for greedy businessmen to get rich off of.
Re:I, for on, am all in favor of this. (Score:3, Insightful)
The Olympics has turned into just another way to turn public money into private money. Quite frankly, I can't think of a single legitimate reason for anyone to bid to be the host anymore.
Has it been four years already? (Score:5, Insightful)
When you consider that Australia (the city of Melbourne, Australia strictly speaking), has the highest population of Greek folks of any city in the world outside of Greece (and Sydney isn't too far behind) then you can bet your bottom dollar that there's going to be a fair swag of small "Mom-and-Pop" businesses, corner stores, etc with some form of 'Olypic' in the name.
Our newspapers regularly carried stories of small businesses being steamrollered by IOC Corporation and its hired thugs (by hired thugs, I mean the government of the host country).
Another common story was the officials and security being briefed to look out for spectators and general public wearing promotional gear (hats, t-shirts, etc) from companies that competed with official sponsors. A coca cola t-shirt for example would leave you being offered the choice of handing it over, covering up, or going home.
Despite all the talk of leaving town for the duration, etc, etc, I did end up sticking around (but I didn't get involved in any of the events organised by IOC Corporation). Strangely, Sydney was a really really nice place to be for those two weeks. Many people dreaded the five ringed circus coming to town, but by the time they packed up their tents and their wagons and rolled out of town again, many of the same were sad to see them go.
That ain't no excuse for steam rollering thousands of little people in the name of corporate greed though. IOC Corporation has NOTHING to do with sport, excellence, peace, tradition or ANY of that nice stuff - it's about corporations and hired governments pumping the people for money.
Me, I make careful note of the companies that sponsor IOC Corporation, and put them on my personal do not buy list for life.
Re:Ah, the Olympics (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember a few years ago, atheletes weren't able to keep and publish an online journal about their experiences, so fans could get an unspoiled perspective of what the atheletes saw. That's bordering on insane.
To make matters worse, television coverage of the games is miserable. In an hour of coverage, you'll get 15 minutes of commericals, 25 minutes of sappy "human interest" stories (This is young Nadia's first olympic games *cue heart strings music* she had to face a lot of challenges to get here, because just two years before the games, her belowed cat Mittens died from old age), 10 minutes of "what you'll see later on" and mindless chatter of the comentators ("You know, Bob, the sun that comes out over Athens during the day is the exact same sun that shines over America." "No, I didn't know that. That's so fascinating, especially since America is so far away", and a whopping 10 minutes of actual coverage of atheletic compitition.
I'm not kidding.
Essentially, the commericalism of the games have robbed it of its soul, and America's TV coverage has made it unwatchable. And forget about trying to enjoy the opening ceremonies; the commentators must be paid by the word, because they don't know when the shut up.
It hasn't been written into law (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Ah, the Olympics (Score:3, Insightful)
Even the RIAA (the orginization we all love to hate) isn't as bad. If IOC members ran the RIAA, they'd file injunctinos against financial institutions for using "CD" as an acronym for certificates of deposit.
As I said elsewhere on this discussion, the only single group I can point at as being worse is the Church of Scientology. When being measured in things like lack of ethics and greed, and you end up somewhere between the RIAA and the CoS, that doesn't say a good thing.
Re:The games formerly known as the olymipcs... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I have an idea... (Score:3, Insightful)
When I make tea or coffee, it's hot. In fact, when I make coffee (generally instant), I use boiling water.
Boiling water hurts, so I treat my coffee with respect, and if I accidentally spill it on myself I accept the consequences. Basically, I accept that it's potentially dangerous as the price of enjoying a hot, caffeinated pick-me-up.
In fact, I'd prefer to get a cup of the hottest coffee I can hold, since then it'll last longer and I can drink it at my leisure. (Aside: If you'd ever been trapped on a commuter-train first thing in the morning, half-way to london enjoying one of the old British Rail's room-temperature cups of tea, you'll learn to appreciate really hot beverages
Basically, coffee should be hot. I'd always assume coffee is going to be around boiling point, so I'm very careful. Irrespective of precisely how bad the outcome is, if I drop coffee in my lap I'm the sole person to blame.
I can understand your point of view that if you assume the coffee is only going to be "warm" then you might not be as careful (and might get a nasty shock), but coffee is traditionally served hot, and fundamentally it's still your choice to be careless with a hot beverage. Frankly I doubt people are going to go "this coffee will cause third-degree burns so I'll stick it in a cup-holder on the other seat, while this coffee will only cause first-degree burns, so I'll stick it on my lap".
To my mind, hot is hot, and injury is injury. If you deliberately and knowingly put yourself at risk of injury, you only have yourself to blame. I'd consider it dishonest to then sue the person who gave you the coffee because the injury you willingly risked turns out a bit worse than you'd expected. It's not like it dissolved her legs or exploded or killed her or anything - the injury was qualitatively the same, just a bit more serious than she'd (erroneously, carelessly) assumed.
That's basically my position - you do something, you accept the consequences. You take a risk, you don't whinge if the negative outcome was worse than you assumed. Particularly if it's only worse because of a decision that's intended to improve the experience for every other customer.
Wildly generalising, the two sides in the debate seem to break down into "do what you want, and accept all responsibility" and "people must be protected, even from themselves". Although in the US I'd probably be considered a liberal, I'm also great believer in personal responsibility, so I tend to fall on the "your fault, grow up and stop whining" side of the debate
Re:I have an idea... (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm also rather biased because I don't have a cup holder in my vehicle
A mistake on her part, sure. The jury even said it was about 20% her fault. It wouldn't have happened if she didn't spill the coffee. But it wouldn't have been nearly as bad if she had gotten coffee from ANY other restaurant in the area, or from the standard home coffee-brewing machines.
I know they're overused on slashdot, but let me make a little analogy. This is like making a car that is known to be significantly more dangerous. So much so that a 20kph accident can result in serious injury or even death to the occupants. You then stick a warning label on the car saying "This car is dangerous", and sell it. Somebody comes along, says "yeah, all cars are dangerous. More legal mumbo-jumbo", and proceeds to get in a 20kph accident. She is then disfigured for life because the car was designed to perform this way. Her fault entirely? The accident, yes. The results, no.
This is coming from a non-lawyer who really hates lawyers, and thinks the american legal system needs a lot of reform, but I do believe that in safety situations any manufacturer has a responsibility to the general population to attempt to make things somewhat safe whenever possible. This is way things such as occupant restraint devices have become requirements in vehicles. If a person chooses not to wear it, fine, but don't set people up for this kind of failure.
I've had 3rd degree burns before, and they are more than just a little injury. Maybe I'd understand if I could taste the difference between scorching hot coffee and really really hot coffee.
One little aside:
If you deliberately and knowingly put yourself at risk of injury, you only have yourself to blame.
Try telling that to someone who does risk analysis for a living. I assure you you put yourself at risk for injury simply by typing this article.
I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree, though I at least see your viewpoint on it and it seems intelligent. I just get annoyed by people using it as an example of a frivilous lawsuit, because it really isn't. There are plenty of examples of real ones, this is just more famous and sounds even worse when you summarize it as "some woman spilled hot coffee on herself then sued McDonalds!"