Not only will Olympics athletes be allowed to use Twitter during the London games next year, but the committee is actively encouraging the practice. Here’s what the IOC has to say in their social media, blogging and internet guidelines for 2012:

The IOC actively encourages and supports athletes and other accredited persons at the Olympic Games to take part in ‘social media’ and to post, blog and tweet their experiences. Such activity must respect the Olympic Charter and must comply with the following. Broadly speaking, the IOC wants people to share their experiences through social media. As a general rule, the IOC encourages all social media and blogging activity at the Olympic Games as long as it is not for commercial and/or advertising purposes.

Athletes are also being warned that any content deemed vulgar or inappropriate could lead to actions as serious as the removal of Olympic accreditation (I’m looking at you, Phelps). This would basically kick them out of the games.

The committee also outlines a specific format that they want all blogging and tweeting activity to take – autobiographical. They want the athletes’ tweets to comment on their personal experience at the games, not report on the games in general, as say a journalist would do.

However, any such postings, blogs or tweets should be in a first-person, diary- type format and should not be in the role of a journalist – i.e. they must not report on competition or comment on the activities of other participants or accredited persons, or disclose any information which is confidential or private in relation to any other person or organization. A tweet is regarded in this respect as a short blog and the same guidelines are in effect, again, in first-person, diary-type format.

As far as media updates to social networks? The IOC is now allowing photos to be shared. Videos can also be shared, but only if they are taken outside the actual venues. During the 2008 Beijing Olympics, photos and videos were strictly prohibited from being uploaded to social media sites and blogs – for copyright reasons.

So it would seem that the IOC believes that the games can benefit from their athletes interacting with fans via social media. Although the IOC is being a little restrictive on the content, it still shows that they are embracing the new technology, especially Twitter.

The debate surrounding athletes and Twitter use continues to rage. On one hand, some feel like Twitter is a great way for athletes to communicate with fans. They feel that there shouldn’t be restrictions put on the athletes by the commissioners of various sports organizations. On the flip side, people cite the foul-ups of people like Larry Johnson and Rashard Mendenhall to make the point that Twitter should be restricted.

This weekend on ESPN radio in Chicago, NFL QB Donovan McNabb let the world know his feelings about the popular microblogging site – he’s no fan.

First of all, I’m not a fan of Twitter. Nothing against their program or what they have, but as an athlete I think you need to get off twitter. All these social networks of you tweeting about you watching a game when you want to be playing in it, but you’re mad you’re not playing in it, so you’re gonna criticize someone that’s playing in it. I don’t believe that that’s the right deal. That’s not professional by any means and you know we are all in a fraternity, so if you see a guy who’s struggling this isn’t the time to jump on him or kick him while he’s down because that same guy will come against you and kinda blast your team out the water, so I think for an athlete to be ‘twittering’ is the wrong move. It’s one of those things to leave to the fans and let them comment on certain things, but athletes need to get off Twitter.

If we can look past the fact that McNabb sounds like an old man railing against them crazy kids and their hippity hoppity and their World Wide Compuserves, he does make one interesting point. Tweeting out your feelings about team performance can do damage to the “fraternity” that he describes. But to say that “athletes” need to get off Twitter is quite the blanket statement.

Although the NFL and NBA have had rules about Twitter in place for years now, other sports organizations have taken a different stance on the issue. Last month, UFC president Dana White announced that he would be giving bonuses based on how many Twitter followers his fighters amassed. He also announced prizes for the “most creative” tweeters.

What do you think about athletes and Twitter? Let us know in the comments.

When YouTube receives a properly filled out DMCA takedown notice, the video sharing site reacts in an animal-like, stimulus/response manner, and down goes the video. It isn’t the fault of YouTube that it has to react this way, but that of the DMCA and its safe harbor provisions.

Free Tibet protesters carried out a video protest in Manhattan, projecting images on the side of the Chinese consulate there. The Olympic logo appeared as one of many images put on display, and recorded on video.

The video also showed the Olympic rings turning into handcuffs, something that probably upset the IOC organizers more than the display of the rings themselves. When video of the protest landed on YouTube and started picking up attention, IOC responded with their copyright complaint.

YouTube displays no thoughtfulness or judgment in pulling down videos; again, that’s a result of the DMCA law and, unfortunately, a sensible action in our extremely litigious country.

However, the now high-profile video has a home on Vimeo, and thanks to that site’s embedding features, others can post and share the protest video as they like.

NYC Chinese Consulate Projection Action 08.07.08 from Students for a Free Tibet on Vimeo.

The IOC and the United States Olympic Committee filed a lawsuit last week accusing at least half a dozen Web sites of selling bogus tickets. The action comes too late to help people find replacement seats at the Games.

The scam has affected people in Australia, New Zealand, U.S., Japan, Norway, China and Britain.

Olympic tickets are only sold through official national agents or the official online ticket store, tickets.beijing2008.cn.

"Anybody buying tickets for the Olympic Games should be careful to buy from an official source. Sadly, there are some fraudulent dealers, known as ‘scalpers’, who are out to cheat fans," said the IOC in a statement.

One of the sites named in the IOC lawsuit, beijingticketing.com  was still operating, offering tickets to a variety of events, including Friday’s opening ceremony, with prices reaching $2,150.

The fraudulent site features an official Beijing Games logo, with a London phone number and an address in Phoenix, Arizona.

"Our sympathy goes to them. The IOC is concerned. We always told people to buy tickets from the official (Australian) supplier," said Australian Olympic Committee president John Coates on Monday.

Beijing organizing committee spokesman Sun Weide said he did not know the exact details of the Internet ticket scam. "So far I don’t know the details. We always encourage people to go through the regular ticketing channels. We are against ticket sales on the black market."

Tickets for events in Beijing were completely sold out last week with seats only available for competitions in co-host cities.

China has pledged to the media that there would be no censorship of the Internet during the Games and rolled back regulations in January that put restrictions on the foreign press.

Even with the more lenient media regulations, foreign journalists in China have expressed concern about ongoing harassment by officials and a Humans Rights Watch report says China is not following through on its promises.

Press commission chairman Kevan Gosper said the IOC would investigate anything that interfered with journalists covering the Olympic Games.

"All of these things are a concern and we’ll investigate them but our preoccupation is that the media are able to report on the Games as they did in previous Games," he told Reuters.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said the press would be able to access the Internet but said some Chinese religious sites would be blocked.

He indicated that problems accessing some Web sites could be blamed on the sites themselves. Liu said some Web sites are difficult to view in China. "Our attitude is to ensure that foreign journalists have regular access to information in China during the Olympic Games."

Gosper said that although China is a country that does have censorship within its media that foreign journalists have been guaranteed open access for reporting on the Games. He also said there had been complaints of slow Internet service and that the IOC was investigating.
 

BEIJING 2008
(Photo Credit: Olympic.org)

China is known for censoring and blocking the Internet, but Beijing organizers have told the IOC’s chief inspector team that the 30,000 media covering the Augsut 8-24 Games would not be effected.

"We were satisfied by the assurances we received across a number of areas — media service levels, including Internet access … and the live broadcast feed," Hein Verbruggen said according to Reuters at the close of the final inspection of preparations for the Games.

Verbruggen said the television signal would be operated by the Beijing Olympic Broadcasters and "There will be a live feed and it is up to every broadcaster to do with it what they want to do," he said. Television cameras will also be allowed to film Tiananmen Square.

Verbruggen said his team had been impressed with the planning of the Games. ""BOCOG is progressing well with all of its operations and we are confident that our Chinese friends will put on a great Games for the athletes of the world," he added."

The rules will allow media organizations to use their own Web sites to host written and photographic coverage of the games if it is for normal journalistic and editorial use. "The Internet is an important medium for the communication and promotion of sport and the Olympic Movement," the IOC said in the guidelines.

"The IOC understands that media organizations have integrated this medium in their business and will be feeding their own websites with Olympic-themed content to target the online audience and to better serve fans."

Non-rights holders will be allowed to broadcast online all or a portion of a news conference that takes plaice in the Media Press Centre with a 30 minute delay.

Most sites will not be allowed to broadcast any other video or audio clips because they are protected by intellectual property rights given to licensed rights-holders.

Web sites in Australia will be able to show short videos under an agreement between Seven Network and the IOC. The deal says that non-official sites will be allowed to run three minutes of Olympic events a day, in 60 second clips, but will have to block their sites so they cannot be seen by Internet user outside Australia.

Kevan Gosper, Australia’s senior IOC member, said, "It is a fairly significant development. The IOC has, for a long time, been at the forefront of supporting both the rights of the official rights holders and fair access to news about the Olympics for media around the world."
 

BEIJING 2008
(Photo Credit: Olympic.org)

China has a well-known reputation of blocking and censoring sites on the Internet that it considers politically subversive or pornographic. "Even this morning, we discussed and insisted again …. that the Internet is open at all times during Games time," IOC coordination commission vice chairman Kevan Gosper told reporters.

"Our concern is that the press is able to operate as it has at previous Games during Games time," Gosper said. "I’m satisfied that the Chinese understand the need for this and that they will do it."

Gosper said that if China did block the Internet during the Games it "would reflect very poorly" on the country. He did believe the Chinese would fulfill the obligations of their agreement.

"They’ve given us a huge commitment and changed their legislation extensively to enable the international press to report on the Games," he said.

New laws lifting restrictions on foreign media in China went into effect on January 1 last year and will expire in October.

The Coordination Commission will hold their 10th and last series of meetings with Beijing organizers from Tuesday to Thursday.