In retrospect, trying to develop online delivery of team statistics and game footage was a rather quixotic affair. One reason was technical (even if KVR had been streaming for the past two years, low bandwidth and slow modems would've made the video fairly useless). The broader reason is that streaming footage would've launched me squarely into a tricky legal situation. Earlier in this manifesto I posited a model of journalists and newsmakers both working to disseminate "news." But what if the concept of "news" doesn't apply in this case? It can be argued that "property" is more apt.

I should stress that I never received any warnings from the Saints or the NFL about intellectual property concerns- the issue didn't come up because I lacked the technical means to force the issue. The earlier post regarding credentials mentioned my request for the team to give me a copy of "attachments" to the 1998 "Agreement for Credential Use;" what I was looking for was Attachment C- "Restrictions Governing On-Line Use of NFL Game Information." I never heard back from the team, and I didn't follow up because the point was moot (I couldn't webcast).

Something I could've done to attract the ire of the team or League was to have my play-by-play data available online in real time. A landmark case in the new field of Internet law is NBA v. Motorola, which deals with the real-time online availability of NBA game information. At this point in time, there is little practical threat that a third party could recreate a football game to an extent that would degrade the value of the contract between the NFL and the television networks. However, it's not too far-fetched to think of a scenario that would make a game recreation a viable alternative.

Say that Ricky Williams were instrumented in a manner that tracked the motions of his arms, legs, etc. This data could be used to create a videogame-quality representation of the on-field action; not too shabby. Now the questions begin- does Ricky own the rights to the motions produced by his own body? If not, who does? The NFLPA? The Saints? The NFL? FOX?

It'll be a few years before things get to that stage, but online intellectual property is already a big issue (two examples are Napster and iCraveTV). In any event, it's in the NFL's interest to exert as much control as possible by getting on-field action classified as property, as opposed to news, which is in the public domain.

There has always been a strange asymmetry between the nfl.com team pages and the team-run websites, in terms of the quality, quantity, and nature of content. A plan to unify the online effort was announced this spring, in the form of the NFL Internet Network. It covers such issues as online game video, link policy, licensing, real-time statistics, advertising, and auctions.

Thus, innovations in game data enhancement are likely to come from sources that are approved guardians of the NFL brand. The only way to bring something cool like this to the public is to cross the line and become official (to become one of the "newsmakers").