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Yes and always will be. Since drive to survive many other sports have tried the similar sort of formatted docu series on Prime and Hulu and other services other than Netflix.
They have not been as big as Drive to survive but maybe they still grew their sports.
Would it not be wise to look to F1 for growth ideas even though we will never be as big? As long as it’s executionally possible…
It did.
For a few years it was huge, had some epic drivers, excellent coverage and was all over social media and the internet in general.
Then they tried to fix something that wasnt broken, and lost huge parts of their audience, and then went down the EV rabbit hole and finally shot itself in the head.
It'd be wise not to model after F1 since they shot themselves in the nutsack with their new rules, and some would say the switch to AppleTV
I will rephrase Adam Silver: "Spectacular NBA Footage on social media posted by fans or websites is free advertising"
Also what is FELD doing with freedom op Press? Is it in the USA possible that they forbid Lewis, LeBig, ... from speaking to the riders on the paddock parking lot? That is outside their "TV Rights deal" if I'm informed correctly.
Can you go into the deep @ML512?
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Am I stupid or did I miss where/what are the proposed changes? 5 pages in multiple responses from ML I don't see where the statements from Feld are or what the actual nuts and bolts are here.
It’s because nothing official has happened yet, just talks, and discussions. It sounds like they were told XY and Z would be happening going forward and the industry has expressed their opinions towards feld about it.
Once it because official it will be spelled out but as of now it sounds like it’s just in the open and waiting for the shoe to drop.
Freedom of the press refers to freedom from government coercion/interference. There is officially no "state media", like ITAR/TASS in Russia. If a company rents out a venue to put on an event, they can prohibit anyone they want from accessing controlled areas. (Controlled areas meaning any area you have to pay to access)
@ML512 and other interested parties: FYI, IMSA (think sports cars, Road Atlanta, Mid Ohio, Laguna Seca, etc.) has a fee structure for photographers and videographers.
Our favorite subject expert, ChatGPT, provided this:
The IMSA situation has become a major discussion point in motorsports photography because they now clearly separate:
That distinction is where the fees come in.
For a recognized editorial outlet — magazine, newspaper, motorsports website, wire service — IMSA credentials are generally still free. IMSA explicitly lists “IMSA-Approved Media Outlet ONLY” as “No Agreement required.”
But if you are:
…IMSA treats that as commercial access, and licensing fees apply.
The big numbers people started talking about are real.
For 2025/2026 IMSA documentation, the published rates include:
I don't necessarily have an issue with FELD doing away with the "fan with a camera" people, but if they are blocking major moto media outlets from covering the sport from the floor, I will be completely gutted. I hang on every word of this shit, any little piece of information is interesting to me. Fewer cameras and perspectives would severely limit the amount of content.
You can report on the races all you want from the stands but sounds like they are now trying to limit who gets to cover and shoot the race from the floor and pits which is understandable.
The UFC did this about a decade ago. So many iconic journalist and photographers were instantly out of jobs. Corporate greed
I think the fans with the cameras are some of the best content. I love watching raw footage of the race, the stuff not on TV. I follow HansonMX, Joeman, and a few other channels. I’ve never watch the media’s version of race highlights because they usually come out too late, but they are excellent for interviews.
Gambling money so they want to limit what gets out to the gambling public ???
I would bet Feld will ban everyone, hire a select few people to cover the races, and maybe leave a few slots open for those who want to pay to play.
Truth be known all it would take to ruin feld and this sport would be the energy drink companies pulling all the money they put in ...
No changes have been announced so it's all rumors at this point.
Again, FELD owns the series so it is their prerogative who gets to shoot or use THEIR content. This is not corporate greed, it is protecting their asset like any copyright or other protected material from any sport or business.
Just like a pharmaceutical company charging $2000 a pill isn’t corporate greed. It’s protecting their own assets.
It absolutely is a money grab.
I'd have to think at least Monster would have to be on board with whatever changes are being made, since they are paying probably tens of millions to be the title sponsor. Maybe it would actually benefit Monster to control the photography and videography in the pits and on the track to prevent the promotion of competing brands...
Pit Row
It's short sighted and outdated. They'd prefer more of a smaller pie with a shorter shelf life than share a larger pie with others. Goodwill matters. Positive feedback loops matter. It's not a good way of doing business, but most corporate managers are by definition sub par so. The nepotistic ones, doubly so.
It'll be interesting to see what this about; curious what is now perceived as over the line that they feel needs to be nipped in the bud.
Feld always has had control who gets credentialed (as does MX Sports), and it's aways, even before Feld bought SX, been more limited than the access to shoot outdoors. It's not easy to get on the floor at SX, and the floor has been restricted in terms of where shooters can go for a long time.
Pretty sure that both the SX promoter and MXSports have for some time provided in credentials a requirement to relinquish copyrights and acknowledge that promoter controls the photographer's work product at the races - certainly was the case when I got credentials 10 years ago. SX has been more aggressive about policing that, but it was generally pretty loose as long as the work product was going to editorial or industry sponsors; the red line had been selling the images to the general public (for example, offering up posters, etc., from current season races).
Is monetizing YouTube/TikTok etc. driving this?
until ML actually tells us what FELD is proposing, we're all just pissin' in the wind.
Every energy drink brand could vanish tomorrow and Feld would STILL make money on the SX series.
I hate the idea of the promoter controlling all media and the narratives. As stated earlier in the thread, the UFC implemented this model and it's terrible. Every once in a while a legitimate question will slip through that fans care about and the response from Dana White will literally be "Who f'ing cares!?" with zero follow-ups or push back. Imagine asking why rider A was penalized a race win for missing a track marker and the response is "who cares!? just watch the race."
LOL. So they just grant a credential to anyone who wants to be on the floor? Cool, I’ll ask for one so I can gain floor access.
Who said they would control it all?? Have you seen an announcement or anything other than rumors about the changes that might happen???
All these vloggers must be a pain in the buttski i bet.
Sounds like the media guys are the new lappers.......
No one (nor did I). I'm giving an opinion on a potential scenario that's purely speculation, as that is all we have to go on currently. I have no details on the actual proposal.
The rumored plan was that Feld would take the production of all digital assets (video and photo) in-house from the races. Eliminating media, teams, sponsors, and riders from contracting or assigning their own people to gather the assets needed for their marketing, news features, reporting, social media, vlogs etc.
This would, in turn, make media, teams, sponsors, riders, etc have to pay licensing fees or per asset fees to the series to have access to some sort of media library or server to use these.
For media, this would potentially remove a revenue source that helps cover the costs of photographers or reporters going to the races, reducing or completely eliminating their ability to cover the sport. For teams and riders, this would just create one more payment they have to give the series after paying entry fees, license fees, potential marketing fees (in the case of OEMs), etc.
The media is upset and worried that they will lose potential revenue needed to offset travel costs and people's time to cover the sport, along with being stuck with a limited range of assets and time limits in which they can use them. Further damaging their ability to cover the sport in their own unique ways, which are needed to differentiate from each other, to capture an audience. Along with potentially just putting people out of jobs, along with controlling the narrative we can tell.
OEMs or series sponsors are upset with the idea because, as many have put it to me "we already spend so much money with the series, and now we'd have to give them more just so we can market that we did well at their races?"
There are a few more layers to it on how it would affect teams. If a gear brand, say Thor or FXR, pays a team say $80,000 per season, part of what they receive from the team is assets from the races to market those riders. Now said team might be able to contract a photographer at a reasonable rate because they shoot for 15 brands and balance the costs vs what each brand or team requests. Under the rumored program, every brand, team, etc would have to pay for assets. So if a brand is now paying extra/elevated costs to get assets of the team riders at the race, because the team now has a license where they can only use the assets for their own channels, the gear brand has spent more money out of their budget. This could cause them to reduce how much they spend with teams, as their total budget has to be used in a wider range of ways. This goes for any type of brand in the sport.
Im assuming this will also mean the end of most content we value including:
Most Instagram posts with race updates and behind the scenes content like pictures of riders from Track Walk
yes Feld employees could theoretically provide some but it will be no where the same quality and personality because each photographer is unique and had their own creative touch — see Lawrence blogs by Tom Journet and the stuff align media puts out
Again Feld is fucking disgraceful. This is probably the worst, most deplorable decision they have made in years even worse than banning rider merchandise.
Great, that means Bondo is also in charge of digital assets. That's exactly what the sport needs.
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