Once upon a time the Olympics was about amateurism and the pleasure of sport. But now there is a distinctly commercial ring to them. So has the Olympics become too much about sponsorship?
Every day there's inspirational footage of the torch relay in the British media.
But anyone lining the route has to wait as a veritable cavalcade of vehicles - with the relay's three sponsors Coca Cola, Lloyds TSB and Samsung shouting over speakers and handing out flags - trundle by before the torch bearer eventually comes along.
It makes people realise that the commercial element is a massive part of the Games now.
Sponsorship has become increasingly important over recent years, both for the brands and the governing bodies footing the bill.
The UK government even passed a new law - the London Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Act 2006 - which, together with the Olympic Symbol (Protection) Act of 1995, offers a special level of protection to the Games and their sponsors.
As well as introducing an additional layer of protection around the word "Olympics", the Games' mottoes and symbols, the law bans unauthorised "association". This bars non-sponsors from employing images or wording that might suggest a link to the Games.
The act has already led to stories of individuals and small businesses falling foul of the rules.
Way back in 2007, Dennis Spurr, a butcher from the Fantastic Sausage Factory in Weymouth, Dorset, was reportedly told to take down a sign showing five sausage rings in the shape of the Olympic logo, with 2012 written underneath. He changed the rings to squares and 2012 to 2013.
Last year, bakers at the British Sugarcraft Guild were reportedly told that using Olympic symbols in icing and marzipan modelling would breach copyright.
Others caught up included a florist that put up Olympic rings made of tissue paper, and an 81-year-old granny hoping to sell a £1 doll - wearing a hand-knitted sports kit with a GB 2012 logo and Olympic rings - in a fundraising sale.
The University of Derby was reportedly forced to take down a banner that read "supporting the London Olympics".
And last month, Birmingham Royal Ballet's artist director David Bintley was ordered to change the name of his latest production from "Faster, Higher, Stronger" - the Olympic motto - to "Faster".
Critics have accused Locog of embarking on an extreme crackdown, and dubbed them the "Olympic brand police".
"Whilst the Olympic movement has every right to protect its registered trademarks and properties, I feel it has been allowed to go too far in protecting its sponsors in the case of the London Olympics. Proscribing certain everyday words only damages the tens of thousands of small businesses that might share in the Olympics feel good factor," says David Thorp, of the Chartered Institute of Marketing.
But Locog says the London 2012 brand is its "most valuable asset", and "if[ it] did not take steps to protect it from unauthorised use and ambush marketing, the exclusive rights which [its] partners have acquired would be undermined".
It is not just the zeal with which Locog has been enforcing brand protection laws that has caused controversy.
Others have objected to the type of brands that have been chosen as official sponsors.
Human rights and environmental pressure groups have campaigned against BP, Dow Chemical - which now owns the firm behind the Bhopal gas leak disaster in 1984 - and Rio Tinto. All three companies have defended their ethical record.
Health issues have also been raised, with London Royal Free cardiologist Dr Aseem Malhotra saying it is "obscene" that the Olympics has chosen to associate itself with fast food (McDonald's), sugary drinks (Coca-Cola), chocolate (Cadbury's) and alcohol (Heineken) when there is an obesity epidemic.
Olympic boxing silver medallist Amir Khan has also criticised London 2012 organisers for allowing McDonald's to open their largest-ever restaurant - which will have 1,500 seats - in the Olympic Park.
The extent of the exclusivity arrangements has also caused consternation, with McDonald's making headlines for a spat over its chip monopoly and Visa coming under fire for effectively banning the use of rival cards at Games venues.
Olympic fans have also had to contend with the confusion of re-named venues, with the O2 centre now called the North Greenwich Arena and Coventry's Ricoh Arena the City of Coventry Stadium.
Meanwhile, athletes have been warned not to tweet or blog about any brand that's not an official sponsor.
So why is the Olympics so much about sponsorship, when did it happen, and are the brand protection laws necessary?
Locog's position is simple. It says in order to stage the Games, it had to raise at least £700m in sponsorship, and it could not have done that if it did not offer its partners protection.
The IOC is similarly clear, saying without the support of its official commercial partners, the Games would not be able to happen.
But for others, the "Olympic brand circus" is doing more harm than good.
"When you get brands parading like peacocks rather than sharing the real essence of the Olympic spirit - it becomes a farce verging on propaganda," says brand consultant Jonathan Gabay.
"There are now so many restrictions because of the sponsors that the 2012 Games are set to be more censored than the Beijing Games."
When you go back to the origins of the Games, the Olympics' has almost done an 180 degrees turn on its amateur and original ideals, says Tony Collins, director of the International Centre for Sports History and Culture at De Montfort University.
He says the first small sponsorship deals started to emerge in the 1930s, normally with local companies, and grew in the 1970s, but it wasn't until 1984 that the Los Angeles Olympic Organising Committee decided to pursue sponsorships. This came after the financial disaster of the 1976 Montreal Games.
The 1976 Games led to a change in the sponsorship model, according to Simon Chadwick, professor of sport business strategy and marketing at Coventry University Business School.
"In Montreal, the Olympic Games had 628 official partners, and a lot of them began to question whether they were seeing any value. Lots of fans and media became cynical and questioned the commercial nature of the Olympics, and the IOC were concerned about what was happening, so in 1984 they decided to stop selling lots of sponsorship for relatively small amounts of money and sell a few brands for a lot of money.
"Which is why if Coca Cola is spending upwards of £100m for a right of association, which is clearly a huge amount of money, the IOC understands brands need category exclusivity."
Then there was the ambush marketing phenomenon - where non-sponsors try to cunningly exploit the Games. The IOC obliged host nations to pass legislation to protect official sponsors from stunts, Chadwick says.
There is no protection for other specific events - such as those of UEFA or FIFA - within the UK, but there is in other countries, according to Phillip Johnson, barrister and associate professor of intellectual property law at University College Dublin. It is becoming part of a trend.
"Portugal granted local protection for Euro 2004. Italy gave protection to Turin for the 2006 Winter Olympics, Canada had protection for the 2010 Vancouver Games and Beijing has anti-ambush marketing laws as well. Brazil has already introduced its anti-ambush marketing laws for 2016.
But Johnson says although the 2006 act has a "broad scope and the uncertainty makes the association right very controversial", as far as he is aware, although Locog have warned people not to do things and strongly exerted their rights, they have not actually started any proceedings for infringement of rights.
"Locog would have to be careful about which cases it brings as it does not want to damage the reputation of the Olympics by bringing the wrong case."
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
Shaadi.com Launches its New Shaadi Centre for Personalized Matchmaking in Jabalpur - PR Inside
Shaadi.com Launches its New Shaadi Centre for Personalized Matchmaking in Jabalpur
Shaadi Centre Office at J.D.A.Complex, Vikaas Bazaar, Civic Center, Jabalpur
Jabalpur: Shaadi.com, the World’s Largest Matrimonial Service launched a new Shaadi Centre in Jabalpur today. Shaadi.com has altered the route of Indian matchmaking and has been a pioneer in the matrimonial industry for more than 15 years. The Shaadi Centre in Jabalpur is a step further to transform the Indian perception on seeking life-partners through offline arm of Shaadi.com. The Shaadi Centre is located at J.D.A.Complex, Vikaas Bazaar, Civic Center, Jabalpur.
through trained relationship counselors who arrange meetings between families, and assist members in finding the right life partner. Shaadi Centre started operations in 2004 and is the 1st national
network of Centers providing one-stop matchmaking services through retail outlets. The Shaadi Centre offers people the facility of adding their Bio-data to the central database, search for a suitable match from the central pool of marriageable boys and girls and get contact details of partners of their choice. Some of the related services offered at the Shaadi Centers include detailed astrology reports, promotion through matrimonial classifieds, matrimonial events and expert advice among others. The goal of the company is to lend structure to the fragmented matchmaking and wedding services industry in India so customers can benefit through efficient, scalable and low-cost services. Today Shaadi Centers are present across 87 locations in India (which include Tier II, Tier III towns) and has a network of over 100 Centers.Commenting on the opening of the new Shaadi Centre in Jabalpur, Nilesh Borgharkar, National Sales Head, Shaadi.com, said “We are elated to launch a new Shaadi Centre in Jabalpur and this is indeed a step forward towards the long term association to provide the best global matches across all religions. In India, a marriage is an emotional concern; parents play an important role in the decision making right from the alliance-finding process. We at Shaadi Centre understand the need of parents and individuals looking out for match and help them by combining technology with the traditional way of matchmaking with benefits such as well-trained advisors, easy accessibility, personal service and a comfortable ambience. Our huge database helps parents and individuals who are not comfortable with technology, find a perfect match across the globe. We hope the new Shaadi Centre helps people in Jabalpur find their ideal match.”
For further information, please contact:
Atul Malikram
9827092823
Source: www.pr-inside.com
Embrace London's distance learning courses and reap the rewards - Daily Telegraph
There are now more than 50,000 students from 180 countries participating in London’s International Programmes, taking a bewildering array of distance learning courses under the aegis of one of the 12 University of London colleges affiliated to the programmes. The latest course on offer, from 2012-13, is a Combined Degree Scheme, allowing students to take a major and minor subject, perhaps wildly different in content. When it comes to careers, it would seem, fewer and fewer people are prepared to put all their eggs in one basket.
While some London students are happy to study for the sake of study, the great majority, not surprisingly, have a hard-headed professional agenda. In an ever more complex world, where people know that their lives can be profoundly shaped by bankers in Frankfurt or New York, but not always how or why, University of London MBAs and other business-related degrees are particularly sought after, as students from as far afield as Shanghai and Melbourne try to beef up their CVs and keep ahead of the pack.
“Our MBA students come from all over the world and all walks of life,” says Mike Kerrison, director of academic development for the University of London International Programmes. “They appreciate the flexibility of our programmes, as they often find themselves moving around the globe, whether for career or family reasons. But what is gratifying, from our point of view, is how they nearly always tell us how useful the MBA has been in advancing their careers, often leading directly to a promotion.”
MBA students are often assumed to be corporate careerists, ambitious and upwardly mobile, using an MBA as a stepping stone to an eventual board level appointment. But many are simply would-be entrepreneurs realising that they need some professional know-how if their businesses are to prosper. Often the best way to start a successful business is to study, in forensic detail, other successful businesses in the same field.
Just as a would-be Olympic medallist could learn from studying videos of Usain Bolt or Sir Steve Redgrave, so someone starting up an online retail business in their garage in Singapore could do worse than study how Bill Gates or Sir Richard Branson made their billions. An MBA, by itself, guarantees nothing. But it teaches students how to subject business plans to proper, rigorous scrutiny, so that elementary mistakes, hopefully, can be avoided.
“That is the beauty of a good MBA”, says Kerrison. “It is as relevant to an entrepreneur wanting to use academic theory to underpin their own business ideas as it is to someone working within a corporate environment, whether at board level or in middle management.”
While London offers a range of specialist business-related degrees and diplomas in areas such as finance and IT, its MBA in International Management, delivered by Royal Holloway College, is probably the ideal course for students wanting to learn to think strategically in a global business environment. It is a demanding course, not suitable for dilettantes, but it covers all the bases.
“What we find among all our students is a real passion for the subject they are pursuing,” says Kerrison. “That is hugely important to us as we place a high value on lifelong learning.”
Think of a London MBA as a 100m sprint and you are likely to be disappointed. Think of it as a marathon, gruelling but ultimately satisfying, and you are likely to last the distance, even finish among the medals.
This article was originally published in The Telegraph Weekly World Edition
Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
London 2012 Olympics: 14 days to go - live blog - The Guardian
Let's look forward for a moment and take a peek at some of the dos and don'ts of the Games. If you haven't seen it, Locog has produced an extremely informative list of things that you won't be allowed to bring into the games venues (if you're a patriotic, big hat-wearing, vuvuzela-blowing, phone-jammer packing, flick knife-carrying type who's fond of a drink, I'm afraid it could be bad news).
Here are some of the items on the prohibited list:
Alcohol; liquids in quantities over 100ml, tents, placards, spray paint, walkie-talkies, radio scanners and phone-jammers, laser pointers and strobe lights, roller skates and skateboards, sharpened combs, explosives and flares, firearms and ammunition
And here are some of the items on the restricted list:
Large flags (bigger than 1m x 2m); flags of countries not participating, oversized hats (sadly no dimensions given), balls, rackets, frisbees, noisemakers such as hunting horns, air horns, klaxons, drums, vuvuzelas and whistles
Don't say you weren't warned ...
A fan blows a vuvuzela at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. Olympic fans may not be able to follow suit. Photograph: Tom Jenkins for the Guardian Source: www.guardian.co.uk
Is marriage the worst financial mistake most men ever make? No, but divorce might be - Daily Telegraph Blogs
Dividing assets on divorce can be an expensive and bitter business
Cynics say marriage is the worst financial mistake most men ever make. Even if they are wrong, divorce might prove them right.
He criticised the “completely disproportionate” legal bills spent on the case by Mark Evans, a successful businessman, and his estranged wife Jenifer.
While the multi-million pound assets involved in this case are exceptional, the sad fact is that it’s not unusual for unhappy husbands and wives to reach for their lawyers. With one in three marriages now ending in divorce and the Office for National Statistics attributing a 5pc increase last year to “financial strain caused by the recession” what can divorcees do to limit the financial damage?
Alison Hawes, a partner in the family law team at nationwide lawyers Irwin Mitchell, said: “Too many people think that spending money telling lawyers to be nasty to their exes will make them feel better.
“I have been instructed to write angry letters – in one case criticising the husband for emptying the garage of all his tools and the lawn mower when he left to set up home with his girlfriend. My client wanted to point out that she could scarcely be expected to cut the grass with scissors which was all he had left behind.
“The response was that the husband would be amazed if she could find the lawn, let alone the scissors. The ping pong of correspondence degenerated very quickly into each party slinging mud not only about their roles in the house, but also their respective shortcomings in the bedroom.
“The best advice we can give clients to help them not spend hundreds of thousands of pounds is to stay as businesslike as possible and make sure they line up good emotional support as they go through the process, from family, friends and from counsellors.”
Ruth Bross of family law solicitors Bross Bennett agreed: “Perhaps there is another drama being played out here – revenge, jealousy, bitterness, greed, the desire to punish a former partner, an unwillingness to move on with their lives.
“Clients often come to me with a very rigid view of what they want to achieve, and they can become obsessed by the concept of ‘winning’ no matter what the cost – but this is a luxury that most people cannot afford.
“Of course, there some points which are worth arguing about, for example obtaining enough from a financial settlement to re-house or to meet basic outgoings. However, I have had clients who have spent thousand of pounds arguing over who keeps the furniture, crockery or pets. My advice to clients is that in the end it is always about the cost, not the principle.”
Perhaps the best way to reach a satisfactory end is to start from the right place. Simon Bruce, a partner at Farrer solicitors of Lincoln’s Inn Fields, told me: “Prevention is better than a cure. Make your best offer to settle as soon as you can. It brings difficult clients to the table and puts them under serious costs pressure if they refuse it.
“Remember, it’s a free world. You don’t have to get married. But if you do, you can choose to have a pre-marital contract to protect your assets. Only people from outer space don’t know they can protect you.
He should know. Mr Bruce represented German heiress Katrin Radmacher whose pre-nuptial agreement helped persuade the Supreme Court in London to cut her French former husband’s divorce settlement from £5m to £1m two years ago.
That set a new precedent in English law but emotional and practical problems remain. As Sandra Davis, head of family group at lawyers Mishcon de Reya, pointed out at the time: “Imposing contractual terms on personal relationships is now fine from a legal perspective; but it is still less likely to be so from an emotional perspective.
“As a nation we’re culturally uncomfortable talking about money. But negotiating the terms of a pre-nup necessitates frank and difficult financial discussions in advance of a marriage about what should happen in the event of a divorce.
“The Supreme Court has proposed that the courts should give effect to a nuptial agreement that is freely entered into by each party with a full appreciation of its implications – unless it would not be fair to hold them to their agreement.”
For example, that could exclude pre-nups which infringe children’s rights or where one partner took legal advice before signing the contract but the other did not. As a general rule, courts will seek fairness and reasonable behaviour in pre-nuptial contracts and divorce.
You don’t need to be a lawyer to recognise that, as Elizabeth Wyse, author of Debrett’s Guide to Civilised Separation, explained: “It may be tempting to throw your husband’s vintage wine down the loo or shred his best suit, but judges will take a dim view of this behaviour. Hold your head high and retain the civilised high ground.”
Finally, remember that nine in 10 divorcees manage to separate without litigation. Alimony costs mean only the very rich or very poor can afford divorce, which can prove ruinous for those in the squeezed middle.
Source: blogs.telegraph.co.uk
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