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Alabama Tracking Students' Locations To Penalize Them For Leaving Games Early (nytimes.com) 114

Posted by BeauHD from the Orwellabama dept.
The University of Alabama is taking an extraordinary, Orwellian step to reward students who attend games -- and stay until the fourth quarter -- by using location-tracking technology from students' phones to see who skips out and who stays. If students stay until the fourth quarter, they will be rewarded with improved access to tickets to the SEC championship game and to the College Football Playoff semifinals and championship game, which Alabama is trying to reach for the fifth consecutive season. The New York Times reports: Greg Byrne, Alabama's athletic director, said privacy concerns rarely came up when the program was being discussed with other departments and student groups. Students who download the Tide Loyalty Points app will be tracked only inside the stadium, he said, and they can close the app -- or delete it -- once they leave the stadium. "If anybody has a phone, unless you're in airplane mode or have it off, the cellular companies know where you are," he said.

The creator of the app, FanMaker, runs apps for 40 colleges, including Clemson, Louisiana State and Southern California, which typically reward fans with gifts like T-shirts. The app it created for Alabama is the only one that tracks the locations of its students. That Alabama would want it is an example of how even a powerhouse program like the Crimson Tide is not sheltered from college football's decline in attendance, which sank to a 22-year low last season. The Tide Loyalty Points program works like this: Students, who typically pay about $10 for home tickets, download the app and earn 100 points for attending a home game and an additional 250 for staying until the fourth quarter. Those points augment ones they garner mostly from progress they have made toward their degrees -- 100 points per credit hour. (A regular load would be 15 credits per semester, or 1,500 points.) Adam Schwartz, a lawyer for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy watchdog, said it was "very alarming" that a public university -- an arm of the government -- was tracking its students' whereabouts.

"Why should packing the stadium in the fourth quarter be the last time the government wants to know where students are?" Schwartz said, adding that it was "inappropriate" to offer an incentive for students to give up their privacy. "A public university is a teacher, telling students what is proper in a democratic society."
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Alabama Tracking Students' Locations To Penalize Them For Leaving Games Early More

Alabama Tracking Students' Locations To Penalize Them For Leaving Games Early

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  • Interest declining? Sounds good to me. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by JustAnotherOldGuy ( 4145623 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @07:23PM (#59192598) Journal

    "That Alabama would want it is an example of how even a powerhouse program like the Crimson Tide is not sheltered from college football's decline in attendance, which sank to a 22-year low last season. "

    Every year, fewer and fewer people give a shit about overpaid grunts playing a children's game.

    Maybe there is hope for humanity after all.

    • Re:Interest declining? Sounds good to me. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Potor ( 658520 ) <farker1@gmai l . com> on Friday September 13, 2019 @07:39PM (#59192640) Journal
      News just in: some people care about things that you don't.

      • Exactly true, and this is a strong reason why I don't see how this will help. The "reward" for sticking with the sporting match is more sporting match. So presumably if you're already interested in sportsball, you already have an incentive to stay?

        • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward

          Not all games are equally interesting. Everyone wants to go to games against big rivals and other similar skilled teams that will make for an interesting game. But there are also plenty of games against smaller schools with much worse off teams. You are pretty sure who is going to win and the games are rather boring when one-sided.

          At a lot of the universities the students can go for free, however there are more students interested in the big games than they have seats for. So usually there is a lotter

          • This is the problem -- for TV money, ticket and concessions revenue, and inflated win records, college football has padded its schedules with non-competitive games. Even though the smaller schools get shellacked, they're in on it, too, collecting big paychecks for serving as a chump to teams like Alabama.

            It's not all surprising that people lose interest once the B squad has scored 3 touchdowns after the A squad scored the first 5 in the first half of the game.

            It was different a few decades ago when teams p

            • Especially for the smaller schools, getting on TV is a huge deal. It's money in their pocket and free nation-wide advertising. It's a no-brainer to sign up to be crushed for them. But as you noted, that makes half the season pointless to watch.

            • So what's in it for the colleges to make people stay until the end? It looks better on TV or something?

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Potor ( 658520 )

          I am not into college football. But I don't see how such clichéd comments about sports contribute to anything but the poster's sense of self-importance.

          However, as to your second question, I hold that, like art, sports showcase a form of human excellence that should be celebrated. It's generally very hard to be good at any sport.

          For this reason, I continue to play baseball (badly), and ride my bike somewhat seriously (although not competitively).

          • The question remains - if you aren't interested in sport, why would the lure of access to more sport mean anything? Why should it? Thats the issue here - forced involvement in something you aren't interested in, and more than that, forced involvement in supporting something you aren't interested in.

            Why can't people simply accept that some people do not like sports - or if they do, they don't necessarily like the sports that are available at a college level. This year, I will watch precisely 21 specific s

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Potor ( 658520 )
              Again, who said anything about everybody? Some people recognize sporting excellence (just as many here will salivate over well-commented code). The dismissive attitudes of the disaffected do not detract from any sporting performance, and just reveal myopia.

          • Thanks for noting below that you misinterpreted/misread my question. Appreciated and noted.

            I will note for completeness that I do have a big ethical issue with gridiron specifically. The evidence seems to be that thanks to brain injury, it is inherently unsafe to play in its current form. But I am happy for you that you find fulfillment in sports that don't have that problem.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Potor ( 658520 )
          oops, I misread your post. sorry.

      • News just in: some people care about things that you don't.

        How DARE they! Those people should probably be put to death.

    • Re:Interest declining? Sounds good to me. (Score:5, Informative)

      by timholman ( 71886 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @07:47PM (#59192662)

      Every year, fewer and fewer people give a shit about overpaid grunts playing a children's game.

      One could make the same argument about soccer, baseball, or any other sporting event. Or any type of entertainment, for that matter. From my experience on college campuses, interest in college football has declined for a number of reasons.

      (1) Student bodies are much more diverse than twenty or thirty years ago. Many undergraduates come from cultures where American football means nothing to them, so why should they become fans?

      (2) Students have many, many more opportunities for entertainment. Thirty years ago, you either went to the football game or you watched TV on Saturday. Today they have a multitude of entertainment choices.

      (3) The crackdown on underage drinking put a huge damper on Saturday pre-game and post-game parties at many campuses.

      (4) College football sold its soul to ESPN, allowing ESPN to dictate fan-hostile game times of 12 noon, 3:30, or 7 p.m. for all games. If your team isn't a big network draw, guess when most of your games get played? It doesn't take many noon games in the August or September heat for students to decide to stay home. Other teams' fans get equally sick of having to deal with constant night games to accommodate ESPN.

      So yes, college football is dying. The fan base is aging out, and the NFL is suffering from it as well.

      • You Forgot Price (Score:4, Informative)

        by Roger W Moore ( 538166 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @08:48PM (#59192816) Journal
        Actually, when I was a UK postdoc at Michigan State I was actually interested in going to see one of their rugby-in-armour games until I saw the price. It would have been an interesting experience but about the only seats I would have been even close to willing to pay for were so far away from the field I might as well have sat in my office.

        If they are still charging as much - or more - than they did back then, then even with a student discount price may be a significant factor.
    • This is mostly about attendance. They want them to say because it looks bad when then bleachers are empty. Football isn't the most rational thing in the world. Sports in general aren't. You're watching somebody play a game. You need to keep excitement up. Kinda like that bit from the Simpsons where Homer couldn't drink beer and got stuck at a baseball game. "I never realized how boring this game is..."

      Anyway it's mostly a) modern college kids are even broker than we are and can't afford the tickets and

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

        The last point doesn't hold up -- the NFL deliberately doesn't play Saturday games until the college season is over, so as not to cause such dilemmas. In the post-season, they do play Saturday games, but the college season is done by then.

    • Every year, fewer and fewer people give a shit about overpaid grunts playing a children's game.

      As college athletes they are unpaid amateur athletes.

      • If they're playing on the field during the game, they are on a sports scholarship, often a full scholarship.

    • It's not interest in "college football", it's the tune-up games against some shitty team no one cares about that Alabama (one of the top couple teams in the country) wins by 60 points. A better solution to stalking students and forcing them to watch crap is to have good teams only play good teams and not bad teams, so the games are interesting. But that wouldn't work well for the sports ecosystem which profits from these stompings and rarer powerhouse on powerhouse matches.

    • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Saturday September 14, 2019 @10:17AM (#59193902)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Ever watch a ballgame in Denny Stadium when the heat index is over one hundred? I have, and it's miserable.

        Damn...if only I could find a way to pay a shitload of money for the privilege of standing in line, buying overpriced stadium food, and sitting next to obnoxious, drunken sports fans in 100 degree heat.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by shanen ( 462549 )

      While you deserve the insightful, I think you were also pitching for "funny" and I'm sorry I don't have a mod point for you.

      The American versions of the Roman Empire's "bread and circuses" seem to have flaws. The bread side is producing excessive obesity and the circus side is too perfectly adapted for destroying minds, both for the players and the television viewers.

      (More could be said, but it's a dying story and I've already satisfied my minimum daily requirements for heresy and blasphemy.)

  • wonder what other permissions it asks for when installing the app.

  • For larger things to come. Also to test how tolerant people are to this. Another step in a very bad direction.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DogDude ( 805747 )
      It's already been thoroughly proven that people don't care about being tracked. People will let random people track them in exchange for a smiley face on their little digital pacifier.

  • Penalizing them?? (Score:5, Informative)

    by CrimsonAvenger ( 580665 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @07:34PM (#59192626)

    It's not really "penalizing them" so much as "not rewarding them".

    If they stay till the game ends, they get discounts on the championship game(s). I'm not sure I see the problem - if you don't care about the games, no problems. If you care, and want the discounts, you let them verify you were at the games. And if you care, but don't give a rat's ass about the discounts for the championship game(s), you refuse the tracking, and you're golden....

    • Like a frog (with its brain removed) in slowly boiling water.
    • The argument is similar to the one against car insurance companies which offer discounts for signing up to be tracked, or grocery stores which offer discounts for using one of the customer tracking cards: as tracking becomes the normal state of affairs, what is now a "discount" turns into the regular price.
    • How about unfair treatment for those without smart phones. I see this as no different than only offering this same special access to people that own a Tesla, but not to anyone that only owns a Ford.

    • It's not really "penalizing them" so much as "not rewarding them".

      But wait for the NEXT step: That's a nice looking diploma you're working towards, it'd be a shame if something happened to it.

      But they really need to do stadium face recognition -- anyone can fake out their phone's GPS address with enough lead-time.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by rnturn ( 11092 )

        ... anyone can fake out their phone's GPS address with enough lead-time.

        Why do people even have their phone's GPS turned on when they're not actively trying to navigate? Turn it off. Your battery life will be greater. (Nobody cares about the latitude and longitude of where you took that picture of your lunch.) And, unless the Alabama officials have a deal with the cellular carriers to provide cell tower information that might be used to put you in the vicinity of the stadium, they're out of luck.

    • Before I quit, my ex employer's health insurance company offered us a $300 annual discount if we submit to their "wellness program" and submit blood tests. The idea, according to them, was not to discriminate against unhealthy people (that would be illegal!), but instead to better identify ways to coach us on our health. You know, they were just trying to help us.

      Naturally, our premiums went up dramatically, so if we participated in the program, we would only break even compared to the previous year. Nex

  • Not really a privacy violation (Score:3)

    by mysidia ( 191772 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @07:36PM (#59192630)

    They're just using the app to verify students are still there through the 4th quarter.

    A lower tech method could accomplish exactly the same thing... For example: "Insert your ticket stub into this machine as you are leaving, and scan your fingerprint to verify your identity."

    Only the 100 points will be available when scanning out, and not the 350 total -- until after a staff member turns a key or pushes a button indicating that the prescribed time has been reached for that award, And your points award depends on when you scan out.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tomhath ( 637240 )

      For example: "Insert your ticket stub into this machine as you are leaving, and scan your fingerprint to verify your identity."

      Way too slow and complicated. Verifying the student is in the stadium doesn't seem like a big deal, especially if the students understand that the app will verify their location while it's open (like pretty much every other app on your phone).

    • A lower tech method could accomplish exactly the same thing... For example: "Insert your ticket stub into this machine as you are leaving, and scan your fingerprint to verify your identity."

      I can't imagine anyone complaining about that.

      • So the university maintains a fingerprint database of all students? You may want to think this through a bit more.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mysidia ( 191772 )

          So the university maintains a fingerprint database of all students? You may want to think this through a bit more.

          These type of systems do not store anybody's fingerprints: they store a set of fuzzy hashes which are unique to the authentication system that can later be used to confirm a match.

          Also, they don't need to be linked against a student, and they do not need to be retained after the event -- just get the fingerprint when they come in and record it against the TICKET not the student, and wh

          • That sounds way more cumbersome and expensive than running an app in the cloud.

            Think of it, the server only has to run during the game, all it does is collect location pings from the app running on the phone, and not one new piece of actual electronics needs to be installed at the stadium. Plus, itâ(TM)s completely passive, it requires no change in entry/exit points.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by mysidia ( 191772 )

              it requires no change in entry/exit points.

              Neither does this, and my understanding is their facility already has computerized Kiosk at each level already, and they already have such gates and terminals as required for students to scan their ID to access their event tickets

              That is likely equipped with a general-purpose computer and peripherals which are standard on kiosks -- as in Touch screens,
              Camera, Reading devices for cards and/or scanner, Or can be easily added.

              In any event, adding a small numbe

        • So the university maintains a fingerprint database of all students? You may want to think this through a bit more.

          I was being sarcastic. I guess I thought readers would think it through a bit more. ;-)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Rolgar ( 556636 )

        Alabama has 8 home games this year. You and 3 friends agree that 4 games probably won't be close in the fourth quarter, and you would each like to reclaim some, or even all (your friend could enter with his ticket, leave and enter with yours) of the game time for three of the four weeks. You sit together, and anytime you're ready to leave, you give your ticket to the friend who is staying to the end that week. You leave, and he turns in your ticket at the end of the game getting you the end of game timestam

    • Seems like they could just use photography of the stands. They know who has the ticket and they have photos of the students already since they took them for a student ID. They could even snap one when they come in to deal with face paint, etc that might change a person's appearance. This seems far less invasive and people are already taking crowd shots anyway in order to broadcast or publish them so it's not some new and unusual invasion of a person's privacy.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mysidia ( 191772 )

        Photography of the stands would be error-prone an not a very practical way to reliably verify the presence of every student.
        Everyone wants their points, but there would be many ways for a student to not appear in a photograph at some snapshots in time --- Such as a student being obscured by other students, clothing, adornments, etc, so you would need effectively multiple photographs or a continuous system, Or capture their photos as they are leaving.

        Once you get computers involved in identifying student

      • Advocating for facial recognition of crowds?

        There are tens of thousands of seats, fans wear hats and sunglasses, and some will paint their faces. Not to mention, I have to believe such an effort would require many, many hundreds of very expensive cameras, or maybe a fleet of drones to scour the stands, harvesting faces... How long before Homeland Security asks to tap into the face photo feed to find âoebad guysâ?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by jowifi ( 1320309 )
      They actually offer this option. From their FAQ:

      I don't have a smartphone. Can I still participate?
      Yes, visit the Tide Loyalty Points kiosk at each level of the student section upon arrival at Bryant-Denny Stadium to receive your points for attending the game. Visit the kiosk before exiting the stadium to receive your points for staying until the fourth quarter.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mysidia ( 191772 )

        That is cool. I imagine visiting the Kiosk involves waiting in line however; and the mobile App is likely more convenient for the students. The app actually provides a quality of life improvement. The Privacy Advocates are just completely tone deaf to the students wishes and desires: concerned only about privacy --- I think its important to recognize that the organizations advocating privacy do Not necessarily represent the students' interests, wishes, and desires: They just have a political/ideo

  • Is it a condition of student tickets to bring your phone? Or to keep it on at all times?

    • No, it's an opt-in loyalty program, you can attend the game without participating, and if you choose to participate you can load the app before the game, get credit during the game, then delete the app after you leave the game.

      • So this could be used to track attendance of first-year grad students who get course credit for attending seminars?

      • Not a great answer. Im a little surprised that such a low UID doesnt see a problem with having to get the exe from a store. I shouldnt have to be in bed with apple/google to enjoy public infrastructure.

        • Itâ(TM)s an opt-in loyalty program, you are free to attend the game without participating.

          This isn't A ticketing system, think of it like those radio station promotions where the person that keeps their hands on a new car the longest wins the car, only in this case people that sit thru all four quarters of every home game gets preference for post-season tickets (early access, lower price, or better seats, whatever that means).

          If you want to game the system get a bunch of burner phones, install the app

  • Oh please (Score:4, Insightful)

    by registrations_suck ( 1075251 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @08:10PM (#59192722)

    The tracking is plainly disclosed. If you do not want to be tracked, do not use the app.

  • And by "penalize" you mean... (Score:5, Informative)

    by kenh ( 9056 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @08:56PM (#59192828) Homepage Journal

    From the /. summary:

    Students who download the Tide Loyalty Points app will be tracked only inside the stadium, he said, and they can close the app -- or delete it -- once they leave the stadium.

    So it's an opt-in program, it only tracks you while in the stadium, and you can delete it after the game without issue.

    And why do this? Because you want preferential access to post-season games.

    There is no more penalty in this than there is in a raffle you choose not to enter!

    As an opt-in program, I don't see any invasion of privacy.

    Students that choose not to participate can still attend any in season game they want, and if they want post-season game tickets there are other ways to get them.

  • Can't skip indoctriatnoinon. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Revek ( 133289 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @09:09PM (#59192864)

    That is all these sports are good for these days. They drain funds that could be used for genuine education and provide almost nothing in return. They preach teamwork while deifying individuals. A simple bread a circus to entertain and make idiots think they belong to something greater.

    • This kind of app is something a second year CS student could hack, and with a small group of like minded students, still have a lot of potential for good old fashioned college fun. CalTech has been doing this to the Rose Bowl for years.

  • Crap, I got into my college football games (undergrad and grad) for free by flashing my student ID. Of course, the teams sucked like a tornado most years so, for many, attendance was mainly a way to meet up with other students you hadn't seen all week, to find out if there were any good parties to go to, or to see what rock song the marching band would cover that week. But $10 admission for a student? Just another way for Big Time College Sports(tm) to add to its cash flow. Shame on Alabama for soaking the

  • It's about time these college sports spectaculars got significantly reduced in importance and by not going to them is the way to do it. I never went to any games when in uni.....and this totally ridiculous "homecoming" nonsense has evolved into solely a money-making venture. Penalized for not going to a game? F-U, I say.

  • "A public university is a teacher, telling students what is proper in a democratic society."

    democratic society. in the 21st century. ahahaahahaa. ahahahahaahahaaha. i'm sorry, i'm back now, after falling off my chair at the joke.

    they're teaching them that orwellian society is the norm.

    The tracking is plainly disclosed. If you do not want to be tracked, do not use the app

    and what's the penalty for not being trackable?

    remember the argument "if you have nothing to hide, you should be fine with us tracking you. therefore if you refuse to be tracked, you must have something to hide"?

  • SEC championship tickets can be scalped

    • Only to other students, if they are smart about it. Have a student ticket? You’ll need a student ID to get in.

  • The location tracking part of the app I was kind of on the fence about.

    When I was working at an university, the network team had your device MAC address and the what/when of the university public wifi access points the devices had associated with. Confirming with the system administration team in the same department could result in discovering the IP address and what university systems that IP address had signed into. If we had problems with a misbehaving laptop such as malware that impacted universit

  • Hear yah . . . Hear yah . . . For only $5 I will keep your throw-away/backup phone in the stands, while you pursue your life goals out there.
  • How about we just hang out in the dorm and get drunk instead?

  • Or completely redone with new rules?

    Everyone knows that the damage done when playing is gruesome and IMHO it would be irresponsible to let people pay or even build a business on it.

    • Because it's fun to watch people getting hurt?

      Look on the bright side, when the jocks are bashing each other's heads in, at least they can't stuff ours in the toilets.

  • Sorry for the naive question, but I just don't get why anyone cares if people show up for the entire game.

    Once you've made the ticket sale, you got your rmoney, so what do you care if someone actually stays the whole game or not? More money from beer sales?

    Or, once ticket is sold, who cares if someone even shows up at all?

    And if the game is bad, say for example it turns into a total blow out, why force people to suffer through watching the end of it?

    And BTW, I'm completely with the folks who want t

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Livius ( 318358 )

      If the game is your entertainment product, knowing how long attendees stay might have some value. But sports have random elements that scripted and edited television does not, so the information is less valuable than it seem. People leaving early from a one-side game and staying at a close one isn't telling you anything surprising.

      Plus the surveillance is creepy.

    • Because they want a full stadium when they’re on TV (and Alabama is always on TV).

  • Get a burner phone, one of you collects them, sits through the whole ordeal and pretends that you're there.

    Get that guy Netflix or Amazon prime so he can at least watch something interesting while he has to sit there.

  • Remember that HUR DUR PRIVATE COMPANY nonesense all these retards kept spouting the last ten years every time our privacy was erroded and we moved closer and closer to a privatized version of China's "social credit" system?

    YOU WANTED THIS WORLD, now you get to live in it, you hipster bastards.

  • This will work for about three minutes until they decide which of them will stay behind with a backpack full of phones and then meet up with the rest afterwards.

    Actually, wouldn't it be more useful to collect data on when attendees are leaving right away, when they are staying for most of the game, and when they stay to the end voluntariliy?

  • false equivalency (for clickbait, basically) (Score:3)

    by argStyopa ( 232550 ) on Saturday September 14, 2019 @09:21AM (#59193752) Journal

    "rewarding people who opt in and then stay to the end" != "penalizing people who opt in and leave early".

  • Glad to see such amazing investment in education by an educational institution [sic].

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