Vancouver Project

In Depth

We want a ‘new media’ approach to the Vancouver Olympics so that the community can have a ‘behind the scenes’ view. We will deliver stories through the real-time web, quick and live video, and social media.

—Mission Statement

The Team

It may be beneficial to work with a team of photographers who are already established as a team (Contact Press Images , Luceo, etc). As such, it might not be necessary to have a team that is known for sports photography. This could add to the unique view of the project. Still, some more traditional sports photography should be produced. Here’s how (in the best case scenario) our team could look.

Monetization Plans

We believe there are numerous solutions to funding this project which are all equally possible and available. As the project evolved, these would become more refined and tailored to the funding demands.

Nonprofit

• Donations a’la NPR, St. Petersburg Times; create loyal fan base.

Partnerships

• MediaStorm
• NYT Lens
• Story4
• Washington Post
• ESPN
• Associated Press
• etc…

Advertising

• Pre-roll
• Banner ads that are geo-aware, targeted to sports fans
• “Sponsored by…”

Freemium Content

• Live (video?) chat with photographers on location
• Prints (posters?)
• Input into which events the photogs shoot
• iPhone app that uses iPhone OS 3.0 to charge for freemium features

Swag

• Create brand around team, sell shirts?
• DVD copies
• iTunes Sales

Our Target Audience

Our audience is net savvy Internet fans (of any age) who we expect to engross in the product as the Olympics progress. We will compete with any other media outlet but our product will offer a substantially different point of view. Asking the viewer to ‘come along for the ride,’ and ‘help in the creation while offering new content is a strong customer pitch. Moreover, we will create a loyal fan base that will be active participants in the content creation. An example of excellent fan loyalty can be seen through NPR.

On an individual level, photographer Chase Jarvis has created a phenomenal fan base solely through his own love of social media. His blog is ranked in the top 10 photo blogs, where he consistently encourages outside-the-box thinking, daily (iPhone) shooting and user input. We want to do the same.

For this project, an active fanbase includes:

• Commenting on recent blogs, work
• Flickr Editing
• Posting links on blogs, twitter etc
• Paying for freemium services

Distribution

A website with guerrilla marketing, sending “press release” emails/blogs/tweets to media-industry-barometer websites, magazines, blogs and experts to spread word. The hope is that some of this content will go viral.

The final product also available for DVD sales or streaming download.

Potential Obstacles

Video rights

NBC has locked in video rights for a lot of money. They have every right to restrict the recording of video, but they’re going to find that very hard to do with the swath of new DSLRs that can record HD video quickly and easily. This is an issue that will be worked out at this Olympics.

Budget

A problem in that we have none right now. We are going to need something in the neighborhood of $400,000 to pull this off.

Time

We’ve got about half a year to pull this off. That’s no small feat. Everything from media passes to training a team still needs to happen.

Advertisers

This is unproven ground. Advertisers need to be convinced that this is a viable chance for unique advertisement opportunities.

Proposed Budget

Our budget was constructed using rough estimates, with the understanding that this is a preliminary plan which will need to be refined. While attempting to stay conservative, this budget was also constructed with a gold-standard in equipment and reasonable wages for the workers. Still, we recognize many changes would occur in the pre-production phase to make this budget more factual.