If there’s one thing in life that I love as much as the web, it’s Australian rules football (also known as AFL). Indeed, I often like to tease my fiance to be that she’ll always be number two in my life behind my beloved team; the Bombers. So it has been with great intrigue that I’ve followed a particular case that brought the two great loves of my life together… albeit in the ugliest of manners. While the story itself broke weeks ago, I have been watching it unfold patiently waiting for the conclusion to the saga. In the end, it evolved into a classic case study of how not to manage a brand’s reputation online.
The Story
The story began with a group of university students with a similar obsession with AFL. In fact, so enthused were they with the game that they created their own blog called Contested Footy. The blog is humble in nature, providing commentary and analysis of the game. During an interview one of the founders claimed the blog receives up to a thousand visitors a day. However, in my opinion this is likely to be the absolute maximum capacity they have achieved. Based on external traffic indicators (Alexa ranking & user comments) I’d guess that their daily traffic is likely to be significantly lower, perhaps even below 50 a day.
In other words, Contested Footy is a small-time blog run by a group of die-hard fans. Hardly the type of publication to threaten a commercial enterprise such as the AFL. However… that didn’t prevent the AFL from gunning for them. On April 29, they sent a ‘cease and desist’ email to the creators of the blog, claiming the AFL owned all trademarks and intellectual property relating to the league, including club logos and images (even those taken at the game independently by the blog contributors). They demanded that the blog remove all relevant material protected by their IP. The AFL was marking its territory. David vs Goliath in its truest form. And it stank…
Technically, the AFL has every right to protect its intellectual property. Media providers pay premium prices for exclusive coverage of the AFL. And it is these very broadcast agreements that have led to the league’s commercial prosperity within the country. However, these laws are in place to protect media suppliers from competitors and rivals. They exist to protect the integrity and value of the broadcast deal. They don’t exist to absolutely exclude any form of alternative commentary on the sport. The legal grounding of the AFL’s claims are extremely weak. The key issue is that the boys at Contested Footy are not competitors to the mass media empires. They’re little more than fans with a passion for the game. And that is where the true problem lies. The AFL is gunning for its’ fans.
The Reaction
Predictably, the move has been met with widespread hostility from the football community. A post on the Contested Footy blog explaining the situation received over 100 comments, most of which were scathing in their view of the situation:
- “Remember when it used to be about the footy? Tell ‘em to get nicked“
- “It amazes me that a commercial enterprise such as the AFL tries to engender loyalty to the code and the clubs on one hand, and tries to collectively smack a “non-official” site over the head with the other hand. Just another example of corporate greed gone too far“
- “The AFL is run by F***wits but we knew that already“
- “If they were smart they would engage with this blog (and the dozens of others) in a positive way, rather than sending out hysterical legal letters. Just makes them look like overly officious tools“
- “In my opinion, the AFL should be paying you, not threatening you. Oh well, sometimes dinosaurs should just left to die.”
To make matters worse, the story was picked up by a range of mass media outlets, most of which offered a negative commentary based upon quotes and interviews with the founders of Contested Footy:
- AFL contests fan blog site – The Age
- AFL cracks down on student-run footy blog – Herald Sun
- Footy geeks defy ban on AFL blog – The Age
- Interview on ABC Radio
In its defense, the AFL claimed it was protecting it’s brand. Patrick Keane, media manager for the AFL, offered the following comment:
“It’s something that we regularly follow with any area, such as websites, such as media outlets, selling AFL photographs attached to a commercial sponsor without the permission of the player concerned. For editorial use there is no issue, but for anything attached to commercial relationship, no. It’s exactly the same as any organisation would do to protect its commercial right.”
Ironically, a move aimed at “protecting” the brand has delivered the AFL a PR disaster. Karmic intervention some might say. For the record, the commercial relationship Keane refers to is the use of Google Adsense on the blog… an advertising stream that nets most bloggers less than $100 a month. And for the boys at Contested Footy, I’d bet my house that they’re raking in less than $20 via Adsense. Which means that in essence, the AFL created this mess for the sake of $20 a month. Smart! Chalk this one up as a win for the AFL’s lawyers…
Well played chaps!
Of course, the AFL’s attitude towards consumer generated media represents a massive missed opportunity. Few brands can engender the type of passion and interest that the AFL generates from its customers. Indeed, marketers across the globe are busily devising strategies to get their customer’s talking about their brand online. Yet in their wisdom, the AFL has chosen to stifle it on external sites, and ignore applications of it on its’ own site. So instead, punters flock towards consumer driven sites like Big Footy, which despite being run on a shoestring, wouldn’t trail the official AFL site in terms of traffic by a significant margin.
Again… well played chaps.
Do you think they’ll ever get it…?
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Like the article.
We are yet to make even $20 from adsense. At that stage we were down $50.
The 1000 visitors a day was after the papers picked up the story. When being interviewed I meant 1000 visitors a week. We’d get about 200 visitors a day at the moment with about 600 pageviews.
Cheers for your article and the link.
James.
Thanks for the support. This is the best summary blog post i think i have seen. Great work.
AFL need to realise the value of crowd sourcing and should review their copyright protection strategy, in my opinion, to reflect the new social media trends.
My pleasure fellas. Always happy to stick up for the little guy! The AFL has been unnecessarily heavy handed and completely unreasonable. They should see this sort of activity as a opportunity rather than a threat. As you guys have said in previous interviews, you’re actually help them promote the brand… God knows what they’d do to people who really do damage the brand (perhaps we should ask Grant Thomas).
just read the contested footy blog post. that’s a stupid move by the AFL. they should be encouraging these type of blogs and engaging the online communities.
even though I’m not a fan of AFL, you want diehard fans to be spreading the love of the game.
someone hand the AFL a marketing 101 textbook.
Really nice article. I especially like your comments.
“the AFL’s attitude towards consumer generated media represents a massive missed opportunity. Few brands can engender the type of passion and interest that the AFL generates from its customers. Indeed, marketers across the globe are busily devising strategies to get their customer’s talking about their brand online.”
We are living in a every changing world ,I think the AFL will get it. However, like anything the corporate giant will just take time.