Nike and Google launch Joga.com 216
hpcanswers writes "Given the increasing popularity of social-networking sites among the young and affluent, Nike has introduced a new site dedicated to the world's most popular sport: soccer. While Nike provides the content (via its army of sponsored athletes, among others), Google provides the technical expertise. Orkut has been very popular in soccer-crazed Brazil, so Google may be able to make a brand extension here. Joga.com is currently invite only, though a form at the bottom of the home page takes requests for invitations." I actually found the launch of a site like this interesting not because of the content, but because of the trend in "private label" sites. It's a Shake'n'Bake Social Network, and you helped make it.
Re:Please name the sport correctly (Score:5, Insightful)
For fringe group sports that go by the same name, you add the nation or region that practices it. Like AMERICAN football.
(Waiting for the flamebait-modding to roll in)
Re:Please name the sport correctly (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's see if I can make this clear: in just about every country that plays this sport, played almost exclusively by kicking the ball with your feet, it's called "foot" ball.
Here we have a sport played almost exclusively with your hands. It's called.. uh... "foot" ball. Brilliant.
Re:Mmm... (Score:3, Insightful)
Why not? Humor is the best way of dealing with the ugliness in the World - especially with things that are beyond our control (yeah, like not buying their products will make a difference when there are millions of folks who don't give a shit and buy it.). That's why there's so much comedy and humor around death. It's the folks who have the attitude of "It's not funny! Don't laugh!" who really worry me and who I stay away from.
Where's the nerd stuff? (Score:3, Insightful)
Is Google still geeky enough for it to "matter" for us, even when their products and services doesn't mean anything at all besides that their servers are rolling?
Re:Should we invoke the "Do No Evil" clause here? (Score:3, Insightful)
At least those people have jobs and can feed their families (although with the population problem over there, breeding is debatable).
Re:Should we invoke the "Do No Evil" clause here? (Score:2, Insightful)
They are paid employees.
It is not Nike's fault those people are in the situation they are in. If they really feel oppressed, they should stand up to their oppressor and take over but they're not.
Re:Should we invoke the "Do No Evil" clause here? (Score:1, Insightful)
I've been in all, and i will say that Nike factories (which are all third party owned/operated) are by and large clean and well-run -- with multiple 3rd party auditors verifying that health codes are met/ wages are paid per local laws, etc.
(i've seen factories in LA that make some of the "sweatshops" in Asia look like clean rooms.)
by the way, most apparel factories that produce Nike apparel have about 5-10% of their business with Nike. 90% of their revenues come from all sorts of other brands - reebok, tommy h, adidas, van heusen, polo, and any other brand you can think of?
by the way, have you ever given thought to where your silverware, plates, household furniture, etc. come from? virtually none of these types of factories are audited by anyone.
Re:Should we invoke the "Do No Evil" clause here? (Score:3, Insightful)
I fail to see how Nike is the cause and not any other shoe or textile manufacturer. Do you wear shoes and if so, where are they made?
How is buying a wooden pair of clogs from the Netherlands from a kid who carved them any better?
Re:Soccer sucks! QWZX (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't let the erratic scoring system fool you, American football is very low scoring, and has touchdowns no more often than soccer has goals. Didn't the latest superbowl have only four touchdowns in four hours? Maybe if a goal in soccer was worth twelve points you'd think it was more interesting?
You neglect the fact that a low scoring game makes the scoring much more interesting, notice how a goal in soccer is a massive event, whereas scoring in basketball is completely irrelevent? A defense-orientated game is much more tactically interesting than where teams score every time they go forwards.
Do you know why Soccer doesn't catch on in the US?
Do you know why baseball doesn't catch on in Nigeria? The answer is just as irrelevent and uninteresting. For the record, more Americans play soccer than gridiron, which is largely just watched on TV. So much for American football being a 'sport', unless in America watching TV counts as a sport.
You know that in America, when talking about a sporting event, people spend more time talking about the adverts, sponsors TV channels, half-time shows, announcers etc than they do the actual game? That just about says it all.
We know that soccer sucks, because we have sports to compare them to.
You know that other countries also have other sports? Some countries even play baseball and basketball, and are actually better at it than Americans. But then in other countries, sport is about sport, it's not just a TV circus.
but almost every child here plays soccer. We know soccer. We just know that it's a bad sport.
They play it even though it's a bad sport? If it was that bad, why aren't all the kids playing gridiron instead? Maybe they've been brought up with the American ethic that gridiron is something to be watched on TV rather than played.
The solution? I've always thought that widening the goals posts would do a lot for the sport.
Yeah, that just about reinforces the stereotype of Americans having low attention spans. The only thing your idea would do is to dumb down the game to make it appeal to Americans, but we don't want people like you watching the game. We want people interested in the sport, not a Hollywood-style Entertainment Spectacle with cheerleaders and half-time shows, where the sport itself is just a sideshow.
Ever been to an NBA game? They have to pipe music over the tannoy throughout the entire game otherwise all the fans fall asleep. Great sport that eh?
Soccer has potential
If being the out and out, undisputed biggest and most popular game in the world is 'potential', then what exactly is the finished product? A few niche sports played almost entirely in North America?
Re:Google using microsoft technology? (Score:1, Insightful)
Both the
Two key facts about Mono:
- Based on the ECMA/ISO standards
- Open Source, Free Software.
What is truly interesting about Joga (Score:2, Insightful)
How many of you will go to a site because of a tv advertisement? Probably quite a few, given my audience. Compare that number though to the amount of people who would join a website/visit a website after recieving an invitation from someone you know. Many more.
It works on two levels:
1. We trust our friends/acquaintances more than other forms of advertising, word of mouth advertising, viral advertising, virulent memes all work on us because of this. Google has formalised a way of doing this with the invitation system.
2. When you go to a website you are used to being able to view content and so on for free. This is especially true with community sites, because the content is not being created by the service provider. However, by removing this ease of access an illusion of exclusivity is created, making us want it more. Of course the volume of people is actually as high, if not higher, than it would be if you can sign up for nothing.
This exclusivity/invitiation system is an awesome way of getting a huge user base of people who are probably actually interested in your service (as opposed to randoms off slashdot, for example)