Media Bowl Gifts

As SF said, the media rate is simply a group rate. As for the FWAA, those aren't gifts from sources or events being covered. Those are sponsorships/deals negotiated by the writers association.

 

Whatever lets you sleep at night. I remember staying at the Ritz Carlton in Washington D.C. while covering a Redskins game. The fan staying in the room next to me was paying $350 a night. I was paying $119. It's a group rate, but it's a group rate because you're considered part of the team's traveling contingent even though you're not technically traveling WITH the team. You're staying at the same hotel as the team and those hotels can jack the price up on the other rooms because they know fans want to stay with the team.

Of course it's a perk. You want to be holier than thou? Pay the $350 a night.

 

You and I won't agree on this -- if I was with the national orthodontist convention, I might get a group rate, too -- but that's OK. It's a side issue on the bigger one.

 

But the orthodontists get a free drink THEY'RE ALL WHORES!!!!

 

It's not a perk if you find out where the team is staying, ask for the group rate and book it yourself.

 

I agree with you that it's at least a discussion. I think the reason this thread reads like everyone wants free shit and sees no problem with it is BECAUSE of the holier-than-thou folks that came on here talking big. It's backlash to the backlash. I would imagine most of us can see a middle ground in the gray area between bags/hotel rates, etc., and nothing at all.

 

The media rate is usually much better than a typical group rate. A convention rate? Perhaps...

 

good discussion...I think there's a line between taking a free shirt/bag/meal provided at a bowl game and taking $20 cash from a parent to get his kids name in the story.

 

It's be more effective if they just said, "Put Timmy's name in the gamer or I'll call your publisher, who golfs with my husband."

"How do you spell your last name?"

"Timmy Johnson grounded into a double play and struck out three times, but showed great effort in a 12-1 loss to the other team."

 

I sell stuff on the side. Reps from various vendors give me stuff; pens, koosh footballs, notebooks, lanyards...with their logo on it. My college roommate is a field marketing rep for one of the brands so I have some insight into how the whole thing works; Most retailers have a dollar limit as to what you can give sales people, usually low like $25.

Should I not take it because I'm a journalist too? Why is it OK for salesmen to take stuff but not reporters? Is it a public expectation/trust issue? I've used a Brand X pen or notebook covering a game....is that wrong somehow?

 

Parents would offer money for that? I've been giving it away just for the occasional positive e-mail. I feel cheap.

Because journalists like to make up a lot of bullshit rules for themselves to make their jobs seem different and more important than they are. *Especially* journalists in the toy department. The rules are usually accompanied by fanciful ideas about what the "reader" wants, which is usually something so highfalutin' that I wonder if the journalist has ever met a reader.