How The Olympics Bullshit Ban On Tweeting About The Olympics Is Harming Olympic Athletes

from the all-about-the-profits-for-the-olympics dept

Tue, Aug 2nd 2016 8:27am — Mike Masnick

Every couple of years as the Olympics gears up again, we end up posting a series of stories about massive bullshit overclaims by the Olympics concerning trademark law. And none of it is actually about what trademark law allows. It's all about the Olympics' weird infatuation with making sure no company that doesn't give them a ton of money first can "associate" with the Olympics. Again, that's not how trademark law actually works, but few companies are willing to stand up to the International Olympic Committee or the US Olympic Committee. This year, the crackdown seems even more ridiculous than usual, with letters being sent to companies who are helping and sponsoring athletes stating that, unless they're official sponsors with the US Olympic Committee, they can't even tweet anything mentioning the Olympics. Companies that had sponsored athletes were being forced to blur out or delete social media posts about their own athletes because their racing bibs said "Olympics" on them.

In our comments, Emily White, the founder of a crowdfunding for athletes site, Dreamfuel, which many Olympians use to help fund their training or the abilities of their families to come see them at the Olympics, shared her story as well. That included being told that a company built specifically to help fund athletes can't congratulate their own athletes:

We're thrilled to be able to provide a new and viable revenue stream to all athletes, whether they are Olympic sports or not.

We have been contacted by the USOC about all of the above (our team was stunned that we cannot publicly congratulate Dreamfuel athletes who qualify for The Olympics). I want to add that we've also been told that we also cannot post the press we've been receiving on the funding we've been generating for Olympic athletes (we don't have a publicist; all press on our mission is organic by nature) because it uses the O word.

I've been speaking with Emily about all of this and apparently after pressure from the Olympics about their special campaigns to get funding for families to come to the Olympics, they were told to never mention the Olympics or "Olympians" at all. They can only say "athletes" who are going to "Brazil" (they were told they can't even say "Rio").

Last Wednesday, the rules got even stricter as "Rule 40" went into effect. This ratchets things up to ridiculous levels and basically says that if a company so much as tweets a congratulations to an Olympic athlete, that could cost the athlete their medals. Really. And, yes, that's totally fucked up. Ridiculously, the Olympics claim that they put in place Rule 40 to prevent commercialization of the games, that are perhaps the most commercialized sporting event ever -- it's just that all the money goes to the Olympics themselves, and not to the athletes.

At least one company went so far as to build an entire marketing campaign around attacking Rule 40:

During the U.S. Olympic track & field trials earlier this month, a flatbed billboard truck traveled around the University of Oregon campus, bearing slogans such as, “Not pictured here: an athlete living below the poverty line to bring glory to their country.” It was part of a campaign, called “Rule 40” in reference to the section of the Olympic charter which it disputes, that went live in early June and has mainly consisted of social media posts and covertly-distributed T-shirts and stickers.

The campaign takes issue with an International Olympic Committee rule preventing any participant in the Olympics—athletes, coaches, trainers and officials—from capitalizing on their own image for advertising purposes from nine days before the opening ceremony until three days after.

There's even a Rule40.com website protesting the ridiculousness of these rules, and it's getting lots of folks talking about how ridiculous these rules are.

Great read on #Rule40 by @runnersworld on the impact it has for athletes, brands and fans: https://t.co/Hhvmsn8JOL pic.twitter.com/fQ8qK0a0sp
— Jonathan Levitt (@JWLevitt) July 28, 2016

Going back to Dreamfuel, with Rule 40 going into effect, she tells me that at least some family members of the athletes using Dreamfuel were surprised and upset to see that a bunch of the images of their children had to come down from the funding campaigns, or the athletes might get disqualified altogether. Because the US Olympic Committee says that companies can't mention anything during the Rule 40 period -- but individuals can -- it leaves Dreamfuel in a weird position where it's announced it can't promote its own crowdfunding campaigns that help the families of athletes get to the Olympics, but Emily can tweet them out as an individual.

#Rule40 & IOC forbids posting the press we've been receiving on our mission. Follow @EmWizzle for media stories on our athletes thru August.
— Dreamfuel (@DreamfuelMe) July 28, 2016

#Rule40 bans #discus champ Whitney Ashley from using her image 2get her fam to Rio but I can https://t.co/N5Q0Yz0gcc pic.twitter.com/DVZX78bxpr
— Emily White (@emwizzle) July 29, 2016

This whole thing is absolutely ridiculous. And the fact that they're threatening Dreamfuel helps underline what a complete lie it is for the Olympics to claim that this is about stopping the overcommercialization of the Olympics. Just like Kickstarter helped make it easier for independent creators to create and innovate without having to get big corporate backing, Dreamfuel has done that for athletes and their families. As a platform, it's the antidote to overcommercialization... and yet the Olympics are silencing the company from even letting people know that they can help support Olympians and their families in Rio.

I'm hoping that someone, somewhere eventually challenges the Olympics with a declaratory judgment filing or something. The trademark claims here are ludicrous and are directly being used to silence speech.

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Filed Under: athletes, crowdfunding, free speech, olympics, rio, rule 40, trademark
Companies: dreamfuel, usoc

60 Comments

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Jason, 2 Aug 2016 @ 8:41am

grant their wish?
I'm hoping that someone, somewhere eventually challenges the Olympics with a declaratory judgment filing or something.
Or, while we're dreaming, how about hoping we just give the IOC what it really seems to want, and no one talk, post, tweet, watch, or think about the Olympics anywhere, ever?
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TheResidentSkeptic (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 8:42am

Personally, I'm following their lead.
I have banned all mention of "that event" from my home.

Anything really important will show up on youtube anyway.
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Whoever, 2 Aug 2016 @ 8:43am

Treaty is quite explicit, and limited.
The Nairobi treaty defines trademark protection for the Olympics. The interesting thing about this treaty and its implementation under US law is that it is limited to a small number of marks, and many that the USOC or the IOC claim people cannot use are simply not included in the treaty and law. For example "Rio" is not protected:

2. Which Olympic trademarks are protected in the United States?

The Olympic trademarks protected by U.S. statute (36 U.S.C. § 220506(c)) include the name “UNITED STATES OLYMPIC COMMITTEE”; the symbol of the IOC, consisting of five interlocking rings; the words “Olympic,” “Olympiad” and “Citius Altius Fortius,” and also the words “Paralympic,” “Paralympiad,” “Pan-American” and “America Espirito Sport Fraternite,” or any combination of these words; the emblem of the United States Olympic Committee, consisting of an escutcheon having a blue chief and vertically extending red and white bars on the base with five interlocking rings displayed on the chief; and the symbols of the International Paralympic Committee and the Pan-American Sports Organization, consisting of a torch surrounded by concentric rings.
http://www.inta.org/TrademarkBasics/FactSheets/Pages/ProtectionofOlympicTrademarks.aspx
https:/ /www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/36/220506
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David, 2 Aug 2016 @ 8:51am

If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
Maybe a bunch of US companies could congratulate all the Russian and Chinese athletes when they win medals.
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Berenerd (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 8:51am

If I had a business, I would donate to Athletes and I would spam the hell out of it. Want to sue me? go ahead, put yourself in the headlines for trying to shut down a small business for supporting someone to fill their dreams. Crowdsource that defense and then counter sue.
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eaving (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 8:53am

Problem being
The main issue though, as much as we all understand that this is legally bullshit is that they CAN enforce their 'no medal for you' policy. So yes a company I am certain could totally get away with tweeting about their supported athlete and win whatever legal backlash came at them. Threatening the very athletes the IOC is pretending to protect, while objectively horrible, will also be effective. If you were shooting for reprehensible but effective than job done guys, congrats.
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Carlie Coats (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:01am

Judicial precedent
In the original decision that established the copyright doctrine of Fair Use, the US Supreme Court declared that Congress may not make copyright law so strict that it violates First Amendment rights.

Logically speaking, the same principle says that Congress may not make trademark law so strict that it violates First Amendment rights. And trying to enforce the contrary should put the IOC and/or USOC in for really huge penalties -- say a hundred-billion-dollar class action suit?
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Anonymous Cowherd, 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:16am

Re: If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
Someone sufficiently bold could just congratulate all the athletes. The rule would quickly be discarded if the alternative was to have no games at all because everyone's disqualified.
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Machin Shin (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:18am

I really think a bunch of the athletes should very publicly protest during the games.

If I was at that level I think I would keep my mouth shut till after the event I was in. Then if I won I would toss their metal back at them and very publicly tell them where to shove it. At that point what does it matter? They can take the metal and say your disqualified, but the world will still know your the best.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:19am

Wow, I had no idea this was THAT fucked up... It almost makes FIFA look good, which is really something you need to put acctual work into! Good on you IOC!
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NeghVar (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:19am

Own the althetes
It sounds like this rule 40 also claims the individual athletes as property of the Olympic Committee. Challenge the rule on that basis
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:25am

Give 'em what they want
I won't even risk the word being heard on my television set this time around, and will shred my newspapers before they get into my house lest the printed word somehow open me up to litigation or threat.

They are dead to me, they should be thrilled if more folks would be like me.
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s7, 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:31am

I thought it had been determined that corporations are people??

People are allowed to tweet all they want.
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Jeremy Lyman (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:35am

Re: Treaty is quite explicit, and limited.
Also remember that Trademarks are designed to prevent confusion, not bestow ownership of words. As long as you're referring to the real Olympics when you say "Olympics" it's not a trademark violation. The IOC anc USOC are trying to push the bounds to mean that anyone who says the word "Olympics" is claiming they are affiliated with the Olympics. That's just not how our language works; for example:
"The once proud and inspirational Olympic Games, International Olympic Committee, and United States Olympic Committee have slowly transitioned into a rancid pool of self aggrandizement and exploitation more disgusting and dangerous than the actual virally fecund waters they hope to subject world class athletes to in exchange for billions in corrupt corporate sponsorships as well as untold costs in local revenue and societal wellfare."
Talking about the real Olympics? Yep.
Not claiming to represent the Olympics? Nope.
Then you're A-Okay!
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:43am

Sometimes it's hard to decide which is a worse IP bully, the Olympics or the World Cup?

Maybe sports fans should get together and create an alternative, non-commercial, non-IP, 'opensource' event, like a modern version of the Friendship Games.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:47am

Re: Personally, I'm following their lead.
I have more important things to do like watching paint dry.

https://www.techdirt.com/blog/innovation/articles/20151121/07242432877/awesome-stuff-lets-bore-c ensors.shtml

Sure beats watching athletes getting exploited.
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kallethen, 2 Aug 2016 @ 9:58am

It's worse than the NFL with their claims over the Sup- um... Big game.

... Dammit, I just got a notice that I violated because they also claim the B and G words above.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:00am

This ratchets things up to ridiculous levels and basically says that if a company so much as tweets a congratulations to an Olympic athlete, that could cost the athlete their medals. Really. And, yes, that's totally fucked up.

They should do it anyway, and then dare the Olympics to go through with their threats and cause an international controversy.

I guarantee it would blow up horribly in the Olympics face, especially if the athlete was from a wealthy country that put a lot of money into the Olympics.

And that's really the only way these horrible rules will get reformed/removed.
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JBDragon (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:05am

Re: Re: Personally, I'm following their lead.
I haven't watched that last couple of them. I just had better things to do. At this point I really don't care. I don't think I'll be watching it this year either. Maybe I'll do some catching up on Netflix.
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DebbyS (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:07am

Re: Re: If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
It would probably be *safer* for the athletes if there were no games at all in Rio or Tokyo due to the literally poisonous and/or radioactive environments in both places. But the IOC doesn't care about that, obviously.
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streetlight (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:10am

And what about other sports?
There are always some kind of announcements about a traditional professional American sport broadcast noting that the descriptions are copyrighted. Not sure whether the game itself is copyrighted. That's the sport involving attempts by participants using a wooden device of cylindrical symmetry to strike a spherical object thrown by an opposing participant in order to propel the spherical object away from defensive participants.
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DreamfuelEmily (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:12am

Re: #Rule40
Hey Machin!

If you search for #Rule40 on Twitter, you'll see quite a few athletes protesting.

Take Care,
Emily
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PRMan (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:14am

Re: Re: Re: If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
Tokyo is thousands of miles from the reactor. But nice try.
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Jeremy2020 (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:14am

Re: Problem being
I would love to see the press on the ioc taking away a medal because someone congratulated an athlete they sponsored.

This seems to be just the thing needed to break open that can of worms.
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DreamfuelEmily (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:15am

Thanks so much Mike & Techdirt for covering this issue! We'd push this piece out on Dreamfuel's social media but..... :) xoxo

Thanks again,
Emily
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Paul, 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:16am

a congratulations to an Olympic athlete, that could cost the athlete their medals.
It's about time this nation-bankrupting venue gets renamed to ASSLYMPICS.
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Ninja (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:26am

Re: grant their wish?
That. Make it vanish. I do pity the athletes that are truly doing their best though.
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Ninja (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:29am

Re:
If anything I'd think Mike would take the fight head on. And many here would fund the fight against these assholes.

For me the Olympics has lost any appeal it had a long time ago. And seeing how bad it is live (it's happening right here now) I have even less sympathy for them.
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ECA (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:34am

Warning: do not read the conditions to be an olympian..
ANYONE know the Jim Thorpe story?
Go watch of read it, you will find it on the net..

UNTIL RECENT..
You could NOT be a professional ANYTHING, to be an Olympian..
You could not Gain any monies from a corp..

In the USA, the Gov. Never backed an olympian..

The rules to be in the olympics are STRANGE and STUPID..

And JUST because:
WHO can Justify the CR of a word created over 1000 years ago??
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Whoever, 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:40am

Re: Re: Treaty is quite explicit, and limited.
As long as you're referring to the real Olympics when you say "Olympics" it's not a trademark violation.

You should read the links that I posted. The Olympics have a special kind of trademark, where the IOC or USOC does not have to show actual or possible confusion in order to enforce these special trademarks.

However, in an example of the dick-ishness of the USOC, the USOC went after someone who wrote a guide book about the Olympic area of Washington state. That use of "Olympic" is an exception to the trademarks that is specifically written into the treaty.
http://seattletrademarklawyer.com/blog/2007/8/13/best-of-the-olympic-peninsula-guide-runs-afoul-of-u s-olympic.html
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JustMe (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:58am

I was out after Jim Thorpe
And this is why we do not support companies that are 'allowed' to advertise with the Olympics. You have Olympic shit on your product? Great, helps me support your competition.
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Caleb (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 11:04am

Re:
How about we convince a few companies to post/tweet/blog about "supporting" Chinese/Russian Olympians?
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David, 2 Aug 2016 @ 11:12am

Re: Problem being
Threatening the very athletes the IOC is pretending to protect, while objectively horrible, will also be effective.

Until that behavior starts to hit the news and lots of people take notice. Then the court of public opinion just might turn against the IOC.
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Adam, 2 Aug 2016 @ 11:17am

What?
Someone tell me again how the Olympics are still relevant. Isn't it just time to turn them off?
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Ninja (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 11:18am

Re: Re:
It doesn't need to be Russia or China. And in fact it would be good if several nations did it. It would be very interesting to see the IOC disqualifying hundreds and hundreds. Of course if it comes to this they will bend, too much to be lost here.
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Ninja (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 11:21am

Re: What?
A lot of money to be laundered and stolen from the citizenry. Can't close that route, can we?

Considering how FIFA got hit with corruption scandals after they came to Brazil (seriously, it was a feast) I'm hoping the same happens to the IOC and the USOC and a bunch of these morons go to jail.
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crade (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 11:39am

"if a company so much as tweets a congratulations to an Olympic athlete, that could cost the athlete their medals"

In other words, the medals are not awarded to the best athletes anyway.. So who gives a crap who gets them anymore?
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orbitalinsertion (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 11:39am

Talk about money for nothing, and lots of it. What the hell does the Commission actually do?

unless they're official sponsors with the US Olympic Committee

I wouldn't "sponsor" them if they were on fire.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 12:26pm

New slogan
Come for the games, stay for the virus and corruption.
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scotts13 (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 3:16pm

Re: Give 'em what they want
I'm with you. Far as I'm concerned, "Olympic" is the size of swimming pool my neighbor has, and "Rio" is a movie about a bird.
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tracyanne, 2 Aug 2016 @ 3:25pm

Re: grant their wish?
I agree, in fact lets encourage them to make even more draconian, stupid rules, and maybe enough athletes will ignore the Olympics, and they will go away forever.
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ECA (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 4:08pm

Re: grant their wish?
would love TO,....
aDVERTISING/WORD OF MOUTH AND ALL OTHER KNOWLEDGE, means someone said something..

NO news is good news, isnt correct if you need People to goto an event..
I can see it NOW, all Airlines do NOT increase Flights to RIO..because they didnt HEAR about it..and Couldnt POST special sales and TIMES for it..because OLYMPICS is CP..
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Atkray (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 4:59pm

Re: Re: Give 'em what they want
I thought "Rio" was the name of a girl that dances on the sand.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 5:41pm

Required reading
This appeared in the Washington Post a couple of days ago; it's required reading:

Olympic executives cash in on a ‘Movement’ that keeps athletes poor

My own take:

I've commented here before about the USOC and IOC because I had some involvement with them in my own (minor) sport. They are ALL about self-aggrandizement and luxury and profit, and couldn't care less about the damage done to host countries/cities or the health of athletes. They've managed to leverage athletes' natural desire to excel and to compete at the highest levels possible into the machinery of their own self-perpetuation.

I got out. I tried changing the system from within for years, achieved almost nothing (not surprising), wrecked my physical and mental health, made a few powerful enemies, and finally bailed rather than self-destruct. Others have done the same; others have persisted, and I salute them, because I know first-hand exactly what they're going through. I've now become convinced that the best available option for everyone on this planet except the IOC, the USOC (and its equivalents in other countries) is to shut down the Olympics permanently.

Which I say sadly, as it could be beautiful and wonderful and every positive thing...but it isn't. And it won't be. It has been corrupted by power and greed into a twisted, sick parody of itself. It can't be fixed. It's beyond repair. It's time to shut it down.
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John, 2 Aug 2016 @ 7:03pm

Re: Problem being
I wonder how the IOC would handle a company tweeting about every athlete in a particular competition. The uproar of taking a medal off of an athlete for commercialisation that they had no part in would be huge. But if they did it to one, they wouldh have to do to all the athletes, whihc I doubt. I do worry that the IOC is so greedy that it would probably ban everyone and destroying the athletes dream.
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Moby (profile), 2 Aug 2016 @ 7:31pm

Just ignore it
I stopped watching said group years ago over this ever increasing ridiculous behavior. Not to mention, they've become an international embarrassment.
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Anonymous Coward, 2 Aug 2016 @ 7:50pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
200 km, or about 125 miles

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.1146825,140.2023351,7z
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David, 2 Aug 2016 @ 10:48pm

Phrase it right and everybody loves you:
Athlete $x was disqualified after the race when his webcrawl tested positive for Twitter.
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David, 3 Aug 2016 @ 12:50am

Re: If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
"Phizer Pharmaceutics congratulates the Russian and Chinese athletes for a very impressive performance."

Oh that would be gold. Or not.
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Jeremy Lyman (profile), 3 Aug 2016 @ 4:32am

Re: Re: Re: Treaty is quite explicit, and limited.
36 U.S.C. § 220501, et seq., vests with the USOC near monopoly rights over the words
So... not a trademark. Is this the kind of thing that could be tossed out as unconstitutional or is it a loophole of trashing citizens' rights to fulfill "international agreements"?
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Jason, 3 Aug 2016 @ 7:28am

Re: Re: Re: Give 'em what they want
Radar Intercept Officer?
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btr1701 (profile), 3 Aug 2016 @ 8:06am

Re: Re: Re: Re: If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
Thousands? All of Japan isn't a thousand miles long.
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John Fenderson (profile), 4 Aug 2016 @ 8:44am

Olympics?
What's that?
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Anonymous, 5 Aug 2016 @ 10:24am

Re: Re: Re: Re: If they are going to take medals away from athletes...
Thousands? Really? Who knew.

And then there's the wind. And diffusion. And the water cycle. Radioactive fallout from Chernobyl fell over much of Europe and Asia.
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Anon., 5 Aug 2016 @ 10:32am

Re:
This degree of douchebaggery would make good material for John Oliver / Last Week Tonight.

It never ceases to amaze me just how many politicians round the planet are not just aware of him, but are kind of awe-struck by him...
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Anon, 5 Aug 2016 @ 10:48am

Re: Olympics?
I'm actually sad that this fine old historic sporting event, this ancient ideal to pit the world's greatest sportsmen and women against each other, this zenith of the human condition, the very pinnacle of human competition, has descended into such obscene and farcical behaviour.

Nothing less than a tragedy.
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nasch (profile), 8 Aug 2016 @ 8:36am

Re: Re: Re: Personally, I'm following their lead.
Maybe I'll do some catching up on Netflix.

What's going to be more entertaining, the sporting competition that shall not be named, or Stranger Things? Hm, tough one. Or not.
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nasch (profile), 8 Aug 2016 @ 8:39am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Treaty is quite explicit, and limited.
Great question, this really does seem to be a questionable restriction of freedom of speech.
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nasch (profile), 8 Aug 2016 @ 8:58am

Re:
Remember, you can talk about the Superb Owl all you want.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Aug 2016 @ 5:18pm

Re: Treaty is quite explicit, and limited.
Washington state has a mountain range and peninsula named "Olympic" and I doubt the USOC or IOC is going to be able to change that.
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