Recently, the International Olympic Committee announced that they would allow athletes and other accredited persons to blog at the Olympics in August. The committee decided that this would be allowed, since blogs are a form of personal expression, and not a form of journalism. That’s great, except for one small problem…with the recent release of the official guidelines, bloggers are finding some very strict rules in place. Specifically, the rules prohibit the posting of still pictures, sound, or moving images.
Over at Nir Ofir’s blog, he has posted the actual letter sent to him by the IOC. On the first page, the rules seem promising, welcoming bloggers by stating that they are not considered journalists:
“The IOC does not consider that blogs by Accredited Persons, in accordance with these Guidelines, will compromise Paragraph 3 of Bye-law to Rule 49 of the Olympic Charter which states that Only those persons accredited as media may act as journalists, reporters or in any other media capacity.”
However, on page two, the guidelines specify that posting of sound, moving images, and still pictures is not permitted. This guidelines apply to any Olympic events, including the “sporting actions” themselves, the ceremonies, or any other activities that require an “Olympic identity or ticket.”
So, they are basically permitting you to post text only? What is this, 1995? So much for user-gen content, it seems. May we then suggest that 2008 becomes the year of the twittered Olympics instead?
