After reading a post over at Mashable regarding why more people aren’t using RSS feeds we started thinking about it and they are right. RSS is marketed horribly though we guess no one actually makes money off the RSS brand so that is probably the reason. For those of you that don’t know RSS stands for really simple syndication. Here is some background information and how to use it. RSS can easily save hours a week.

We think for sports fans RSS feeds can be extraordinarily important. For those of us that go to multiple sports websites a day and check up on our teams there is no reason not to subscribe to our teams feed whether it be in Google Reader, Google Homepage, My Yahoo, or the 100s of other readers out there. It is real easy to do and that is why we have decided to change our RSS button to an Easy RSS Button so if you haven’t subscribed to our feed go ahead and do it. We suggest all bloggers explain their RSS feeds and how they work. If you are worried about people not coming to your site just make sure you use a feed that you can monetize like feedburner. Here is ranking of the top 10 feeds in Google Reader for the US and how many subscribers they have.

1. 1,652,082 subscribers Espn.com: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/rss/news

2. 740,632 subscribers Cnnsi.com: http://rss.cnn.com/rss/si_topstories.rss

3. 723,117 subscribers Espn.com – NFL: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/rss/nfl/news

4. 639,085 subscribers Espn.com – MLB: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/rss/mlb/news

5. 638,097 subscribers Espn.com – College Football: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/rss/ncf/news

6. 625,727 subscribers Foxsports.com: http://msn.foxsports.com/feedout/syndicatedContent?categoryId=0

7. 582,488 subscribers Espn.com – NBA: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/rss/nba/news

8. 514,257 subscribers Espn.com – Mens College Bball: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/rss/ncb/news

9. 118,340 subscribers Espn.com – Bill Simmons: http://sports.espn.go.com/keyword/search?searchString=bill_simmons&feed=rss&src=rss&rT=sports

10. 40,636 subscribers CBSSports.com: http://cbs.sportsline.com/partners/feeds/rss/home_news

AOL has purchased Fleaflicker for an undisclosed amount of money. Fleaflicker had one solo founder, Ori Schwartz, who built the site from the ground up. AOL and Ori have both been tight lipped on the purchase price but according to Roto Nation the price tag easily could of been high six figures or low seven figures.  Its great to see a solo founder with no venture capital or outside investment get a pay day like this.

It will be real interesting to see how AOL can scale the Fleaflicker fantasy platform.  As most people are reporting AOL purely bought the Fleaflicker product for its technology and not its users.  AOL previously was using Fan Ball for its fantasy application so this has to be a huge blow to Fan Ball.

According to Dnxpert, Mike Levy, the founder of Sportsline.com which is now CBS.Sportsline.com is preparing to announce the Open Sports Network.  Straight from the website “At OPEN Sports, we are creating the next generation social powered sports experience that combines social media and community tools with a fantasy sports gaming marketplace and traditional sports content.”

“Our goal is to create your ULTIMATE SPORTS DESTINATION… a place where you can compete against other passionate fans with next generation fantasy games, participate in a new kind of social experience around gameday, get the latest sports news and information from around the web, and become your own sports editor – organizing and seeing only the content that you care about.”

This should be real interesting to see what type of product Mike comes up with here.  He did a great job building Sportsline which was a first generation fantasy site so one can only assume the Open Sports Network will do some amazing things.

This is pure speculation here but I am thinking that much of the same team that built Sportsline is probably building Open Sports Network as we speak.  It has been a while since CBS acquired Sportsline so my guess is Mike’s non compete is about to run out.  I am sure CBS we be keeping an eye out on this one.

Website:  Score OS

Interview With:  Randy Burgess

Contact: info@scoreos.org

Is their more then one founder? If so, who are they?

The SCORE OS project was founded by Don VanDemark (Lead Developer), Randy Burgess (Lead Developer), and Jim Burgess (Business Manager). Don has worked with fantasy sports statistics retrieval and fantasy sports management systems for almost a decade. Randy has developed and hosted fantasy sports management systems for fantasy college football, college basketball, and major league soccer for the past eight years. Jim Burgess has run the business operations of Pre Pro Sports for the past four years. The SCORE OS is a side project for all three founders in addition to their normal day jobs.

What is your background and qualifications?

Don has worked with both open source and closed source technologies with IBM and Microsoft technologies prior to learning open source systems and has a business degree from the University of Florida. Randy has worked with ASP.NET, SQL Server, MySQL, PHP, and Drupal technologies and has a Business/MIS degree from the University of Georgia. Jim has a management degree from Georgia Tech and is a Certified Public Accountant. All three of the founders have played fantasy sports for the past 10-15 years.

What does your website do?

SCORE OS is an effort to develop an Open Source Fantasy Sports Management System for businesses and hobbyists, alike. The goal is to develop a technology foundation for any fantasy sports game that would need a database and a web-based interface (i.e. hosting, user management, scoring, roster management, waivers, database, messaging and communications, etc), which would then give developers more time to create new, innovative games for the fantasy sports industry. From your typical head-to-head fantasy NFL games to your Major League Soccer niche roto league manager to your combined MLB and Minor League baseball player stock-trading game, the SCORE OS platform will be designed to help develop them all by laying the groundwork.

How do you generate revenue?

After the SCORE OS platform is developed further, we expect that revenue could be generated for business-quality technical support, site/application hosting, or from custom fantasy game development for specific firms. However, the higher goal of SCORE OS is to provide a means for other firms to utilize and develop the technologies with which to drive their own revenues and make the entire fantasy sports market better for small business owners and fantasy sports consumers.
 
How have your marketed your site?
 
Thus far, we have only sent out a single press release and we have started a weekly blog to discuss news related to progress being made on the SCORE OS project and the fantasy sports technology industry.
 
Funding: Self funded, Angel Investment, or Venture Capital?

Self-funded at this time, but always looking for contributions in development time and technology resources.
 
Are You currently looking for funding?

Not at the current time, but we would be open to offers.
 
What type(s) of technology do you use?

Our next system will run on a LAMPD stack (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP, and Drupal). This system will give the SCORE OS platform the benefits of security and design by the thousands of developers who work to improve the Drupal CMS system while SCORE OS developers can work on the fantasy sports management system core.
 
What is your favorite feature on your website?

At this point, we haven’t released the application, but we are looking forward to releasing a League News Feed and Team News Feed that works similar to Facebook, FriendFeed, and Twitter: A continuous RSS Feed that can be subscribed to and retrieved in an RSS Reader or elsewhere that provides details on Fantasy League news, chatter, and transactions.
 
Any Bold Predictions for Sports and Technology in the future?

As the bandwidth of the broadband pipe grows and more consumers use Internet-based tools for their entertainment and social networking, we expect Sports Technology to increase the amount of live data streams, audio, and video feeds available for both current and archived sporting events based on fans/users preferences. We also expect to see a trend where fantasy sports games and highlights/clips will be delivered in “customized packages” based-on fantasy owners’ specific rosters and player choices.

According to TechCrunch, Live Current Media has paid $50 million for  the exclusive right to broadcast a new Indian Cricket League’s games online.  Amazingly the Indian Premier League is on track to make $2 billion in its first year of existence.

Live Current Media owns Cricket.com so this is also a play to make Cricket.com the number one destination for Cricket online.  They will be taking Cricinfo.com head on which ESPN purchased earlier this year for $50 million.

It will be interesting to see if Live Current Media can use the Indian Premier League to steal people away from Cricinfo.  Exclusive rights for broadcast of this league should have ESPN worried about their Cricinfo investment.  It would be interesting to know how many people in India visit Cricinfo.com.  We assume it could be a very high percentage.

Website: Gate 21

Interview With: Matt

When did you start your blog?

November 2007

What made you start it?

Just wanted a creative way to participate in the sports discussion and found blogging to be the easiest method to do this which allowed me the flexibility to say what I want, when I want without having to worry about being filtered or having to fit my thoughts into a model developed by others. Also really enjoy the graphic arts side of the web, and added that as a sub-part of my blog.

What is your background?

Tennessee Alum and season ticket holder, a practicing attorney by trade.

Do you blog for fun or are you trying to make it a career? What is your goal with this blog?

As much as I would love to make some money from blogging, I haven’t. Be that as it may, my primary goal is to do it for fun — it is a creative outlet which is as fun as it is challenging.

What was your tipping point? What put you on the map? (if you bring in more the 5,000 uniques a month)

Not yet to the 5,000 uniques a month status. I focus on my message (a/k/a original written and graphic content) and though it has slowed my growth a bit, I have tried to avoid simply using gratuitous pictures of scantily clad women to draw hits — there are a few on my site occasionally, but it isn’t a regular thing. My most popular attraction is my Tennessee Home for the Visually Offensive, which is a collection of photoshopped/farked photos related to sports.

What type of blogging software do you use?

Wordpress 2.3.3 (self-hosted); PhotoPlus 11, Inkscape, and Post2Blog.

What ad network(s) do you use?

Currently use Adify (YardBarker Network), Commission Junction, and a few direct affiliations. May be switching to Adify exclusively due to better payment structure.

How much money do you make off your site monthly?

A few dollars, never more than $ 5.00

If you could get something for free to help you out with your blog, what would it be? (Ex: design, marketing, ad optimization, etc)

Advertising Optimization, I suppose. Graphically I am happy with it — I do all my own graphics, mainly would just like to get more traffic.

What are some of your favorite blogs?

Loser With Socks, Rocky Top Talk, Everyday Should Be Saturday, Brahsome, Busted Coverage, Your Mother Slept With Wilt Chamberlain, 3rd Saturday in Blogtober, Deadspin, Hugging Harold Reynolds, Fulmer’s Belly, Get the Picture, etc.

Any bold predictions for the future of sports on the internet?

The internet is just going to continue to grow as a medium for sports coverage and expression. I imagine that the primary mode of delivery of live content will eventually be Internet-based. The real question is whose content will win — the marketplace of ideas is becoming more and more crowded, with less and less real difference in some areas. In the end, however, as is the case with all blogging, content sells.

Website: Dallas Morning News Mavericks Blog

Interview with: Tim MacMahon

I read that you were on the beat at the University of North Texas.  Tell us your story starting how you got the job at UNT and how you landed at Dallas Morning News.

I was going to school and working for the UNT campus paper when Denton Record-Chronicle sports editor Richard Durrett offered me a part-time job that paid a whopping $7 per hour. Part-time ended up being 39 hours a week, and that job turned out to be a great start to my career. Durrett let me be the No. 2 guy on UNT while I was a part-timer, and I took over the beat when he got promoted to The Dallas Morning News. Since the DRC and DMN is owned by the same company, I covered the UNT beat for the DMN for a few years and got to know several editors downtown. They brought me downtown to be the lead high schools writer. After doing that for a few years, I covered Texas Tech and Baylor last year and got the blogger gig when Matt Mosley left for ESPN.com.

How do you like blogging vs. beat writing?  Is there a big difference?

I love the blogging gig. Sports are supposed to be fun, and my editors let me have a ton of fun on the blogs. I kind of treat the blogs like an Internet sports bar, and I’m there to generate and direct the discussion, some of which is goofy and some of which is serious sports talk. Some of the stuff I write for the blogs is similar to traditional beat coverage, but the jobs are totally different. Breaking news is a bonus for me, while that’s the top priority for a beat writer. More often than not, I react to news that our beat writers break.

What is the biggest difference between you and the writer from Mavsmoneyball.com besides the fact you are paid a full time income?

A decade of journalism experience, the accountability of representing the largest newspaper in the state and the commitment to dedicate a full work week and then some to the blog.

Do you like Mark Cuban?

I’d much rather cover a team that has an owner as passionate and accessible as Cuban than one with a boring guy who just considers his team an investment. Cuban is an interesting character, and that’s good for the blog.

Did your blog’s traffic heavily increase when you originally banned from the Mav’s locker room?

No, but we were coming off a record month with the Jason Kidd trade.

What is your dream job?

DMN columnist who still blogs a bunch.

What advice do you have for young writers who are looking to become professional writers?

Get as much experience as possible while in college. Clips and contacts are more important than anything you’ll learn in a classroom.

Any bold predictions for the future of sports, blogging, and professional journalism on the internet?

No bold predictions, but I’d strongly advise budding journalists to familiarize themselves with the blogosphere.

*Kissing Suzy Kolber is hosted at kissmesuzy.blogspot.com and Kissingsuzykolber.net. Most of their traffic goes to the blogspot address so we used that address for stats. The same is true for Awful Announcing.  Mgoblog is only at Mgoblog.blogspot.com

It looks like sports blog visits overall where down compared to last month.  We would think this would have to do with the NCAA tournament taking more eyeballs to the main network sites.  New to the list this month is MgoBlog which is a fine Michigan blog that we did not know about.

According to TechCrunch, Yardbarker which is basically turning into one of the largest independent sports social networks on the internet received 6 million in funding led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson and includes investors Russ Siegelman, Ronnie Lott, Jarl Mohn, Labrador Ventures, and Baseline Ventures. 

This should give adverstisers in their network a good boost as they will probably be able to higher more sales people to sell their ads.  They have done a great job of acquiring new general blogs and athlete blogs.  They have also done a great job providing value to their blogs in the network.  It will be interesting to see if they can keep doing this once they have to worry about making a profit.

Fox Sports decided to run with a story on the popular Matt Leinart Drunk Pictures floating around the internet that originated at The Dirty. Here is the article that Fox Sports has on the subject.

It seems like they should have just reported on the story and linked to the pictures or not put the pictures up at all. We all know there are blogs all over the internet that use photos like this to get attention. In the early days pictures like these propelled Deadspin to the number one blog on the internet. I think its real interesting that there is not an author on the Fox Sports article. It’s almost like some editor desperate for page views wanted to do a story but none of his writers wanted to do it.  Probably because they have integrity.