English Soccer Club Swindon Town F.C. Has Banned Almost All Media Access
By Ty Duffy
Swindon Town F.C., a club in the English third-division, has banned media access to the club. According to the New York Times, the club won’t be providing almost no media access, beyond league-mandated post-match press conferences.
"In effect, the team has eliminated non-game-day news media access. Reporters, photographers and videographers are largely barred from interviewing any member of the team, the coaching staff or the club’s management, save for a hurried question or two for the manager at a postmatch news conference. Lee Power, the Swindon owner, who put the policy in place, acknowledged the irony of giving an interview to explain the decision but defended the policy because, he said, “at the end of the day, the local paper needs the football club more than the football club needs the local paper.”"
The club will offer fans access through its in house PR. In some respects, this is isolated. A low-profile English team in Britain’s 40th largest city is battling it out with, mostly, its local paper. Though the underlying reasoning is worrisome. Sports teams have social media. They can access fans directly. They don’t need media coverage for exposure. Entertainment reporting doesn’t serve a vital public interest.
An apocalyptic scenario where a sports league closes off access and funnels news through its website and pliant networks is far-fetched. The greater danger is that happening by default as local news infrastructure crumbles. We are heading increasingly toward a world where access only happens at the behest of the subject, if not there already.
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