Deep Backward Point

Most sports have barriers between casual fans and the game. Some are larger than others. I remember watching soccer as a kid, and while most of the game was straightforward (kick ball in to net), the off-side rule always tripped me up. Suddenly the game would stop, the ball would change hands, and only an expert with a slow-motion replay could tell you why.

When I started watching the NBA, I could never explain the various fouls (was that travelling, a 3-second violation, or just a regular elbow to the ribs?) and the one trillion timeouts in the fourth quarter. A friend once tried to convince me that they actually stop the game so the broadcasters could show advertisements.

Compared to cricket, though, these are minor barriers. The objective is still “get the ball in the net“. Cricket is a complex sport with various arcane rules and the fans who are within the fold– those of us who get it– usually enjoy the game because of these intricacies, not in spite of them.

The modern changes to the game that DuckingBeamers describes are different:

I don’t have any particular animosity to DRS, or Duckworth-Lewis, or even the 15-degree rule — I accept that the science behind them is generally rigorous (even if Hawkeye still freaks me out a little bit). But I worry these technocratic rules raise a barrier between fans and the game, and I yearn  for a simpler discourse that respects fate and fortune over human agency — if only because I think fans should understand the game they profess to love.

These are changes that create barriers between the dedicated fan and his sport, not just casual fans. They may be fair, if the fairness of sport is judged in a court of law, but it’s not clear they make the sport better. Much worse than the off-side rule made me suffer as a player and viewer as a child, these new innovations bring you out of the game and force you to accept an external reality.

It’s all smooth sailing until, pause: the mathematicians say India lost, or the biomechanical engineer says your bowler is a chucker, or the computer says you’re out. They force you to accept that you, the dedicated fan, can’t explain the game you love. It’s fair, it’s science, but perhaps it’s just not cricket.

Ok, I can’t promise the Hollywood big-shot part. But I can promise the warm, fuzzy feeling of helping two great people you don’t really know make a movie.

Ok, I can’t promise they’re great people. They look awfully nice in their Two Chucks videos on Cricinfo. And one of them has been awfully nice to this blog in the past. (“Please, I don’t want to read your stupid blog, give me the link to fund them!”)

Here’s the documentary, currently being filmed by Jarrod Kimber and Sam Collins in Australia (trailer):

Death of a Gentleman is a snapshot of Test cricket through the Australia vs India Test series in 2011-12. Is Test cricket dying? Does anybody care? How can a sport be run so badly and hope to survive? Sam Collins and Jarrod Kimber ask these questions and more of cricket’s biggest names and the fans who will decide the game’s future.

But if those aren’t reasons enough to help fund their documentary on cricket, here are three more:

1. It’s cheap: you can spend as little as 10 pounds, and still claim you funded a major foreign documentary. Make sure you say “foreign” if you want to sound pretentious. If you’re from the UK, claim it’s really Australian, and vice versa. Make sure you do not say “foreign”, if talking to wingnuts. Also, don’t be cheap.
2. You get freebees: Depending on how much you spend, you get all kinds of knick-knacks, doo-dads, and even a Producer credit. The Producer credit only goes to the obscenely wealthy.
3. They have a sense of humor: Or humour. These are the guys who had the balls to call themselves Two Pricks. Let’s face it, if you were watching a documentary about the rumored death of cricket as we knew it, wouldn’t you want the bearers of bad news to have a sense of humor? Gallows humor never hurt anyone. Except for relatives of the condemned.
4. They are serious: Sure they have a sense of humor, but they are getting this thing made for real. The filming is in progress, they have already raised 35,000 pounds.

Ok, that was four reasons. Now that you’re convinced– it’s very simple. Go to WeFund, and fund Death of a Gentleman.

Willow TV has released their own official FAQ. Please read that first. The below information may be out of date. This FAQ will be updated as new details emerge. Here is the original article on this story, with many comments from those affected. Please suggest additional questions (for me or to pose to Willow staff) in the comments or on Twitter. 
Read the rest of this entry »

First off, apologies for calling you cricket pirates. Personally, I’d love to be a cricket pirate, traveling the seven seas challenging his majesty’s naval force to timeless test matches.

In the three days since the Willow TV story broke open, this blog has been the center of activity. What started as a two line blog post, has since expanded in to a long, developing article on the state of the story of legal notices that Willow TV sent to (perhaps thousands of) people accused of subscribing to pirated cricket streams.

In three days, the article has received thousands of visits, mostly from people searching for “willow tv legal notice” and related strings on Google.

At the same time, we have received dozens of comments from the accused on the blog, by email and on Twitter. Already many of the cricket pirates are collaborating through the comments on this blog. Here is a sampling of some of the best comments so far.

Iqbal Khan wrote a long, heartfelt comment. A key excerpt:

Like many, i did not know at all that willow.tv is the official broadcaster of cricket matches in North America until I read their (threatening) email. [..] If I or others really wanted to cheat then we would have opted for free streaming websites but instead we paid for the WC2011 matches which clearly shows our intent of not doing anything wrong intentionally.

Many others have rallied around Iqbal’s counter-offer to Willow in the comments.

Many in the comments have questioned Willow’s methods– sending an email through a marketing agency, with no offline contact information and no details on the nature of the violation. Here is an excerpt from loobadshah:

I, like most people, will be willing to pay the required amount and get out of any liability but the way they have approached this is quite ridiculous. You sent out this legal notice through a marketing and newsletter distributing agency – who in the world does that?

Others have astutely pointed out that simply viewing a pirated video online makes pirates of many of us through YouTube. Here is Somesh:

So what is next ? I view some pirated video which is put on youtube and I have to pay for that ?
Is it the end user’s responsibility to ensure that the streamer owns the copyright ?

Similarly, here is Ankur:

The whole argument by Willow TV has no merit at all. Its like Apple suing all the Samsung mobile users because they have some patents which Samsung is using and vice-versa.

Others have started digging up Willow TV’s historically bad record of customer service and public relations. And this incident only makes things worse.

Also, other web sites have since picked up the story. GigaOm spoke with Willow TV CEO Vijay Srinivasan, and Medianama did a report as well.