Vancouver Project

This all looks really good :)

I'd be interested in participating :)

Forgot to mention, and probably because it is so ubiquitous, and commonplace around here, NowPublic.com, one of the leading citizen journalism sites in the world is based in Vancouver.

Time magazine named them one of the top 50 sites in 2007.

Michael Tippett and his crew are highly respected and have by far the most sophisticated local indie news infrastructure to disseminate 2010 Olympic backstory.

NBC is pissed that the USOC just announced they will get in the online game, but they should really be worried about these guys.

I have no idea what 2010 plans NowPublic has if any, but they definitely have powerhouse potential when the heat is turned up in February.

http://www.nowpublic.com/search?fulltext=1&type...

You're welcome Joey.

Thanks too for your response earlier today. The Vancouver Project is starting to make sense.

I'll send more your way when I see something appropriate.

One other point re partnering with local media; Canada is experiencing the same economic challenges as news companies in the U.S. In fact one of the Olympic news partners is teetering on economic disaster and could go chapter 11 any day. We don't actually call it chapter 11 in Canada, but you get my drift. I'm thinking you might have more success with a NBC affiliate (official broadcaster) than you would shaking the bare trees here, but who knows.

We work closely with progressive local business owners (retail, restaurateurs, clubs) interested in sharing local colour with the world. We do seminars and teach them how to use blogs and Twitter to independently leverage Olympic momentum. I can't stress more about how intimidated locals here are of even breathing the word Olympics. We saw the same thing in Turin 2006. It's a struggle, but some of the more advanced get it. http://area46.com/2010/

Traditionally, it's a sector purposely ignored by Olympic organizations. We gravitated to this group because in this Twitter era, they are the back story. We're currently developing a web presence we hope will become the Olympic underground - party central to the 21-34 wired demographic (athletes and spectators) who come to Olympic events to blow the roof off the world. We're looking for the Bode Millers and Ross Rebagliati types - talented renegades full of passion who thumb their nose at IOC rules. Basically, we want to hook foreign athletes and spectators up with the best clubs, restaurants, and sport adventure retailers OUTSIDE of the official Olympic Zone. Outside the zone btw, in our volatile world, is the safest place to be during an Olympic event. Come to Canada and party in peace and not worry about radicals, protestors ... or worse. That's our story and we're sticking to it.

Don't hesitate to contact me if you have specific questions.

Cheers,

Maurice

Citizen Media and the 2010 Olympics - SocMed meeting

http://brucesharpe.blogspot.com/2009/07/citizen...

Amazing panel. Thank you!

Don't overlook hooking up with the USOC - United States Olympic Committee.

www.usoc.org/

More spectators will come from the U.S. than anywhere else in the world. Many will drive, especially from the U.S. west states.

BC just announced they will put another train in operation between Seattle and Vancouver/Whistler for the Games, which means a lot more people now will stay in Seattle and commute daily - possibly even athletes, and their support teams.

@Maurice–

First and foremost – thank you so much for all your insight. I've added all of your points to this page, and will likely roll them into a blog post in the near future.

The following are my quick responses:

• We're not trying to do any "ambush marketing" actually, we'd like to cover the olympics with the same access as any other reporters. Only, we'd like to present different kinds of content. Where most photogs and reports focus on the games, we want to focus on the back-story. What makes these games go?
Why should you care? Because behind-the-scenes is a really, really, popular niche.
• We absolutely want to be accredited. Actually, we're really hoping to partner with organizations that have the level of access that we need. Stealth mode is not an option because: a) oops! too late!, b) like you say, would go against the very principles were advocating.
• Talking with the government of Canada might be a long, and involved conversation. Might that be more work that it's worth? What sort of laws should we be worried about? Like you say, I'm ignorant of Canadian law in many respects (though I personally have a lot of respect for your universal health care). To my mind, as long as we're able to take pictures, and be around the games, life should be good.
• You're likely correct about local media trying to cover the back story. They'd be great folks to partner with! That's great advice! We're not trying to step on toes, but I think you'll agree that what we've outlined here hasn't been done by any of the local media outlets, at any Olympics, ever.
• Your comments about the Olympic athletes go right along with our understanding, and our concern. To our minds, such a non-transparent system is actually harmful. It will change eventually, if not overnight. We'd like to think we can help that process.
• The video you've shared is amazing. Mayor Robertson sounds thoroughly impressive.

Again, I can't tell you enough how much we appreciate all you've said.

All the best,
—Joey

Oops! I forgot one thing too: A humble apology for taking 3 days to respond to you. That's not like us at all, and our only excuse is having 'real jobs' and a holiday weekend in the way.

Forgot to wish everyone a HAPPY 4th of JULY in my post above !!

Spelled my name right this time too - sheesh.

I like your enthusiasm and ideas, but judging by the info on your site so far, and if I understand it correctly, VANOC and the IOC will consider your involvement "ambush marketing."

My suggestion; either come up with a way to become accredited, which is virtually impossible, or operate in stealth mode until you're ready to launch. This means you should not share all your plans openly online. Yes, it goes against the core of what social media represents, but you are challenging a very powerful organization.

Keep in mind the IOC and VANOC partner with all levels of government in Canada; municipal, provincial and federal, which means they have more resources and access to you than you might imagine.

When the IOC wants a law changed, they simply ask and it happens. Canada is not the USA. We have different regulations here so don't assume that what you can get away with in the U.S. will fly here. On the other hand, we are very liberal in many respects. The point is that you have to know the differences.

The Olympics is a monopoly and they guard their brand very aggressively. They don't even allow local pros who have been proposing to do what you want to do to join the party as "unaccredited photojournalists."

Local mainstream news media will also not want to see you competing on their turf. Most people don't realize that local mainstream news media are Olympic partners, well paid by the IOC to tell the Olympic side of the Olympic story, which means they have a vested interest to keep you out. Telling the "back story" is a task they feel is their job so I doubt very much you will find them cooperative, in fact I suspect it will be the exact opposite.

The good part of this is that there is an incredible back story that needs to be told on both the sports side and the social scene, so once you get to a certain level people will come out of the woodwork. Keep in mind though that almost everyone here is intimidated by the IOC, so people won't get onboard with you until they see you make some serious headway, athletes included, and especially.

There's a lot of pent up frustration by Olympic athletes. IOC president Jacques Rogge has them so scared they hardly even blog, at least in the traditional sense. It's also not a coincidence most Olympic athletes don't make it easy to contact them through their websites, which is completely opposite of websites managed by musicians and artists.

It's also very hard to find an Olympic athlete website that allows comments to be posted, and if you do, it is so heavily moderated it's impossible to have an open discussion. Olympic athletes are eager to find an alternative platform as long as it doesn't impact their careers, which means you will have to tread carefully and be sensitive to their position.

At this stage, the best advice is to learn as much as you can about the unwritten rules and Olympic cult. My blog and book are two places to start and can get you up to speed quickly.

http://www.LeverageOlympicMomentum.com and http://www.OlyBLOG.com

If you have time, which you really don't, you should also check out publications by Richard Pound, Tony Webb, and Helen Lenskyj. They all have different agendas, but basically draw the same conclusions, which is, unless you have big bucks to sit at the IOC table, you're not welcome. Don't underestimate how much politics plays a role in the Olympics. It is no longer about sport. It's about big money paid out by Olympic sponsors.

On the plus side, you might find this recent video by Vancouver's mayor Gregor Robertson interesting.
http://blip.tv/file/2296963

Vancouver is developing two indie media centres. Turin had one and so will London 2012, but Vancouver will be the first Olympic host region to have two since Soc Med became so popular, and the plan so far is to have one of them operate completely independent of VANOC and IOC influence. The other indie media centre being developed is loosely affiliated with the IOC .

As you get deeper into this you'll discover a lot of challenges. Some subtle, and some very much in your face. The best way to manage it is to know what occurred in recent past Olympic regions, and balance it against rapidly growing social media momentum.

Play your cards close to your chest, at least for now.