uk_martin

Looking forward to more of this on 9th August. Sod the GP's, this IS atmosphere! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3u_BhUkWws#t=42

The same Workington that had to abandon a meeting because they couldn't get a road ambulance there last year?

I don't know about the round ball game, but in Rugby Union, the RFU's Facebook site invited people to submit their videos that they think show the best tries scored. See, interaction with the fans in action! (speedway take note) The result has been a welter of vids of tries scored in kids rugby, ladies rugby, as well as vids from the top echelons of rugby. Some of the best have been re-broadcasted on Facebook (remember that word "interaction"?) and a prize will be awarded at the end of the season for the try of the year. Were this speedway, the only reason fans would be invited to submit video clips would be so that Terry Russell / SloSpeed & co could round up everyone who has breached their copyright restrictions and then sue them into a black hole in space.

Lucky you lol! You also have the ability to automate the posting of content from your main site to Facebook and Twitter, and to see any activity from Facebook and Twitter on your main site. All free of charge, free of any extra effort, just with someone at the helm who's au-fait with the possibilities that exist out there. Naturally having supporters spreading the word does help as well. You can also produce, at no cost, RSS feeds that you can promote and distribute to anyone who has a News Reader. Oh for the opportunity of using other social media tools like "AudioBoom" "YouNow" "Qik" and "UStream" to be used as well...but of course you'd get GoSpeed threatening you with hell and high water if you went anywhere near breaching their copyright monopoly on all things multimedia.

I bet it's as much to do with old dogs and new tricks. Has anyone got a list of the ages of the promoters in the UK? Let's face it, those guys in their 60's and 70's who need a 6-year-old to programme their video recorder for them, aren't going to grasp the social-wide-inter-web-media-thingy nettle are they? HOWEVER, that doesn't mean that they shouldn't appoint a Social Media and Promotions Officer into the club's structure, whose job it would be to get the brand and the product "out there"...it doesn't even need to be someone who likes speedway, just someone who's clued up to the millennium that we live in.

Mildenhall Air Base is home to cargo planes...maybe "load" isn't far off the mark. Go to an airbase the home of a fighter squadron, THEN you'll know what "loud" is!

Nah, if he hadn't been drunk, he'd not be in this mess now. Simple. Being messed around with the dates is the least of the punishments that he should get. My prediction is that the weight of the BSI Box Office / Poole Pirates Management will be brought to bear, Darcy will get a 2 year ban, 1 of which will be "suspended", less "time served", less time off for good behaviour, and he'll be free to ride again on 15th March.

I bet the airllines and hotels are getting well hacked off with all the cancellations and rearrangements of his travel plans lol Page 10 then - Unlike "drugs" which are banned, end of, no dispute...alcohol is NOT banned, as long as it is not above a set limit at the time of the competition. Go above the limit, Mr Ward, and no matter what other excuses you have, you fall foul of the regulations. Well that document is very black and white...but let's see how many shades of grey the FIM can magic up eh?

Simply being a dope isn't quite the same thing is it? Do the FIM's regulations specify what substances are banned under it's generic heading of "doping"? This may be of more interest to Patryck Dudek fans than Darcy Ward fans.

Another nice touch from the Stal Gorzow stable (lol) - every month they make available for download a range of PC desktop wallpapers, featuring action shots or rider photos, with that month's calendar in a row of dates towards the bottom, and every Stal Gorzow and other important fixture shown in that calendar. Again, not rocket science, something useful, and something eminantly do-here-able... if only anyone had the inclination.

I like the way that Stal Gorzow use Facebook to post pictures of their fans who have bought season tickets. Can't help but think that images like that encourage other fans to buy season tickets by getting in on that "me too feeling" Neigh on 2500 season tickets sold with more than 2 months to go til the start of the season. Can't be harming the cause can it? Not exactly the sort of rocket science that can't be repeated over here either is it?

How many clubs will have gone under between now and when SloSpeed get their act together? How many fans will lose their teams? But who cares about them eh? As long as the establishment looks after the establishment and the bureaucracy looks after the bureaucracy and Terry Russell's pockets contain all the pieces of silver that they should then all will be well with the world won't it? WHAT A MESS!

So what you are basically saying is that os that SkySports control the sport and how it's allowed to present itself to the population at large? They have nothing else to do to pass the time of day right? And if SkySports don't want a team to be promoted then they have the right, as controllers of media rights, to strangle the life out of the media exposure that a club can be given? Are you serious? This is what you say is "in the best interests of British Speedway" right? So there's one for you...BBC and ITV, whose sports coverage everyone says is not nearly enough, the fault lies not with the BBC or ITV, it's all SkySports's fault, according to what you are saying. SkySport control what's able to get out there. That's what the impact of what you are saying isn't it? It's up to SkySports whether ITV and BBC can show speedway on their local and national news and sports programmes??? IF that's right, why isn't it the fault of SloSpeed who agreed to the handing over of control of media exposure, in return for the big proportion of the pieces of silver that were handed over by SkySports. Terry Russell is OK Jack isn't he? He has been getting his pieces of silver in his pocket every year, To hell with everyone else eh? All in the best interests of British Speedway Terry Russell...

Not to mention the Super7: So shouldn't the Super7 now be a Super6? Was the ELRC changed to ERC for last year when it became an "invite who you can and mess people around with the dates championship"? Or did they forget to change it, and out of luck rather than judgement, it's gone back to being an ELRC agin for 2015? TOTAL TOSH. Let me quote you from GoSpeed's own web site: GoSpeed are in control. End of. There is no way that you can palm off blame onto SkySports for witholding the use of independently produced audio and video footage. GoSpeed claim to own all the copyrights of all media shot in speedway stadiums (what a little monopoly that is, for nobody's benefit !) so it was Ronnie Russells's say-so and no-one else's that was needed. The only thing that was stopping Ronnie Russell from giving permission, in my opinion, was that there was no profit to him in it for doing so. A hallmark of everything that's wrong with the sport in this country.

One thing's for sure. There is a ZERO chance of there ever being an SGP in Glasgow now.

If stating the facts is being negative, then you have to examine why the facts are negative, not why they are being stated. Also, on your point about the best interests of British Speedway (I love that phrase - are you CVS in real life?) answer me this, Firstly, WHY did GoSpeed prevent Birmingham Brummies from having a fantastic publicity opportunity in the City Centre in 2011? Secondly, is this why GoSpeed have bought the worldwide broadcast rights to Polish Speedway, just so that the Polish product could be embargo'd from being seen by the British public, in case it shows up the British product on a Monday as a pale shadow of what happens in Poland on the Sunday?

Ben Barker + Lewis Bridger haven't even been mentioned yet, and it's already starting to look like the current crop of riders have inherited the totally inept attitudes of their governing body. Examples of Professionalism, Organisation and Discipline needs to be set at the top...hardly a surprise then when the riders turn out like this then, is it?

There have been "exciting things" planned ever since 1) every team had to have Columbian registered web sites and 2) every web site had to agree to prime site advertising space being dedicated to GoSpeed, exactly for their exciting plans that would be the next big thing. That was some years ago. It's still not happened. See, it's as simple as that. One lady in the middle of Norfolk does a better job of promoting her team than the massed ranks of the BSPA / SCB / AP Mafia / GoSport / Orville et all, all put together. Good job these people aren't running the NHS or commanding troops on the battlefield then isn't it? Now that bit I can well believe. The first thing that a burocracy has to do is to protect the burocracy. Good luck with getting your "nods" lol. I recall in 2011 when there was a World Cup on, plus Wimbledon, plus a Royal Wedding, plus, plus, plus...etc the Birmingham promotion needed "the nod" from GoSpeed to show a promotional video for Brummies Speedway in the advert breaks on "The Big Screen" in Birmingham's Victoria Square, where tens of thousands of people would have seen it. Anyone who was at the Birmingham City ground at the start of that season would have seen something similar...but according to what Mick Bratley told me at the time, all was ready, but as copyright holders, GoSpeed needed to give their permission to show the video...and it never came.

Now there's interesting. Birmingham denied "official" e-mails for several years for sending bulk e-mails but Berwick allowed to get away with sending bulk e-mails to this day. No wonder Alan Philips contended that "the establishment" was out to get him. But hey ho, that's another story. Coming back to the point, does anyone here subscribe to any Polish or Swedish Facebook pages? I keep tabs on the Stal Gorzow Facebook Page, and I have to say, I'm well impressed with their output. I have to say I think that they are light years ahead of what teams do in the UK. There are plenty of lessons to be learned from them, I just wonder if anyone will...or do we carry on with our heads in the sand in this country and leave Facebook to the younger generation, who we don't encourage into the sport anyway? Let's face it, the fans in the 90's never had Facebook, and the fathers of the fans of the 90's never had Facebook and the fathers of the fathers of the fans of the 90's never had Facebook. Whjy should speedway dabble with this new fangled technology now eh? Anyone would think it would want to succeed or something.

Language Timothy!!!

What it seems to me is that there is a combination of a few issues. Firstly, feelings in Argentina towards the British are not exactly caudial, so maybe there is something to what the riders are saying... Secondly, where the hell was the advice and assistance from the Foreign Office and/or the BSPA/SCB to the British riders who were, rightly or wrongly, going to represent their country and fly our flag? If you want to go to some parts of Africa or Asia or a remote country, you can get advice from the Foreign Office about what to expect when you go there, what to look out for, what the dangers are etc etc. My money is that these two riders are so internationally inexperienced that they didn't even think to ask for advice or guidance and that the lack of international street-wisdom is a direct result of the lack of international exposure that British riders get compared to foreign riders who cross borders several times a week. That said, if they did ask for advice though, I'd hate to think what they'd have got from the authorities. Thirdly, were they on their own or did they have a "tour manager" there to look after their interests, look after the paperwork, and to make sure that they had a base of operations, equipment, support services etc?

The problem with e-newsletters as I found out from Birmingham's experience is that "the establishment" don't like clubs using them. Birmingham had all it's "@birminghambrummies.co" e-mail facilities blocked during the Philips regime because the volume of e-mail traffic that the Commercial Department was putting out in order to promote the club was in danger of being identified as "SPAM" and therefore black-balling the BSPA server, causing everyone in British Speedway to be affected. You'll notice that Berwick can produce their e-Newsletters because they run an independent web site and are in control of their own e-mail deliveries free of interferance from "the establishment".

I agree Deano. Marketing the sport NEEDS doing at all levels. At a national level where we are in the safe hands of Terry Russell t/a GoSpeed International and of course Keith Harris and Orville. So we are in safe hand there aren't we? And they really care about spreading the word about the National League don't they? Like, Buxton have really benefited from them in past years haven't they? Also we need to increase our exposure on Social Media, which is why "the establishment" banning speedway videos from YouTube, and speedway photos from Flickr and Instagram etc etc just makes SO MUCH sense, doesn't it? No, sorry to have to say this, but charity (or marketing as the case may be) is going to have to start at home. We can't rely on "the establishment" to look after us. We have to show that we are Birmingham Speedway, NOT Benefits Street. Birmingham has to sink or swim on its own merits. If we get a helping hand from national initiatives, then that'll be a nice Brucie Bonus, but don't hold your breath whilst waiting for it.

So hopefully there will soon be announcements about new initiatives to attract a new generation of fans to the sport. I fear that the same old recipe served up in smaller portions won't be the answer.