MLB: Use Electronic Surveillance To Capture Fans' Data, Not Opponents' Signs

theodp writes: Major League Baseball Regulations "prohibit the use of electronic equipment during games and state that no such equipment may be used for the purpose of stealing signs or conveying information designed to give a Club an advantage," reminded MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred Monday as harsh punishment was meted out for the Houston Astros sign stealing scandal. You can read the Commissioner's full statement at MLB.com, after you first carefully review the site's 5,680 word Privacy Policy which, ironically, attempts to describe the many ways that MLB will use electronic surveillance to collect and share information about you and your friends.

MLB, a poster child for Google Marketing, boasted recently that the data it collects has enabled it to literally put a price on MLB fans' heads in the form of a Lifetime Value (LTV) metric. "Understanding our fans' budgets allows us to customize the offers and deals we present them," explained the MLB Technology blog. More details are available in Data Science and the Business of Major League Baseball (PDF, Strata Data Conference slides).

Re:

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

The men on the moon played baseball as kids.

Translation

[nospam007]

"Understanding our fans' budgets allows us to customize the offers and deals we present them,"

Read 'suck them dry'.

Sport vs Sport

[DrYak]

Read 'suck them dry'.

It's a commercial sports event (as opposed to some game between friends in you backyard or some outdoor activity in the wild).
What were you expecting ?

As soon as there is competition (prizes!) and media involved, the whole thing gets corrupt to the bone and over-the-top obsessed with money.

Re:

[kot-begemot-uk]

"Understanding our fans' budgets allows us to customize the offers and deals we present them,"

Read 'suck them dry'.

That is what marketing does for a living and that is what they teach 'em in a business school at the MBA course.

It is also the real reason behind the opioid crisis, fatso crisis and every other similar crisis we face. It is not a question of "if" an MBA graduate will combine and apply the methods of Stazi and Al Capone. It is a question of WHEN.

This is why we need regulation. If not, we are shortly back to the point when Coca Cola name fit the contents and the same content was in school cookies for the

Re:

[JaredOfEuropa]

"Understanding our fans to customize the offers and deals we present them," is ostensibly what marketing does: the required collecting of personal data is a privacy nightmare, but that way of marketing isn't really evil in itself. It's mostly an attempt to present potential customers with offers that they are likely to be interested in and able to afford, it's mostly done at an aggregate level (demographics) and at worst it's a lame attempt to capitalize on the weak minded.

This goes a bit further: not j

Re:

[himadri88]

In my opinion this is fine [ckfootage.com] . Major League Baseball Regulations "hopefully did well by banning the use of games and electronic equipment during games, because they must have taken all the factors into account.

Re:Translation

[damn_registrars]

And this differs from other professional sports how? I live in a city that has a professional baseball, professional basketball (both men's and women's), and professional football team - and we have a professional hockey team not very far away. In defense of MLB, baseball is the cheapest ticket in town by a long shot. I can get weekend tickets to a baseball game for less than Tuesday afternoon basketball, even though their seasons are similar in length and games played. Football is of course outrageous due to having far fewer games at home. Hockey is a long schedule but a much smaller stadium, which of course reduces supply and drives up prices.

In the summer of 2018 I bought a four pack of tickets to baseball - with hot dogs, chips, and soda for all four - for $70. That doesn't get a single seat at football at all, it might buy a nosebleed seat or two at basketball. Hockey would play for $70 if the game is a team nobody cares about.

Regardless all the professional sports groups are out to make money, it is their mission. Just because NFL has a non-profit status doesn't mean they aren't making money hand over fist; they know where their best returns are.

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[ravenscar]

There are 162 games in a MLB season. There are 82 games in an NBA season. Further, the average NBA arena holds less than 19,000 fans. The average MLB stadium holds 42,675. Over the course of a season (81 home games) the average MLB team can host 3,456,675 fans. The average NBA team can host 779,000. That means an MLB team has roughly 4.4 times the seasonal fan capacity. I wouldn't call that similar.

That said, it doesn't really negate the rest of your post.

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[damn_registrars]

Thank you for the math correction. I'll admit I'm not a basketball fan (as you may have suspected). I should have looked that up; I just figured since the NBA post-season seems to be about 3 months long now that the regular season must be of similar length to MLB. A quick peak at the schedule of my local NBA team though shows me that they only play two days in a row on very rare occasions, which quickly explains why they play fewer games over a similarly long season (in terms of calendar days from start

It's the essence of capitalism.

[BAReFO0t]

Either you accept capitalism, and its essence of giving everyone else nothing and taking from them EVERYTHING with it.
Or you're not.

Can't have the one without the other.
Make up you mind.

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[account_deleted]

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[account_deleted]

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What if I'm a fan, copying all those signs?

[BAReFO0t]

Of course I've got a life, and am making things, so I don't need to project myself into grown losers who still only ... play games.

"sign stealing"

[Tom]

It's irritating how US-centric the US media is. There's a huge article about something called sign-stealing, but nobody ever bothers to explain what the heck that even is, because of course every single reader ever knows that, yes?

A nod to the international audience, maybe? Just one link to an article explaining it or something? Takes no effort.

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[demonlapin]

Wikipedia's article is linked in TFS.

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[DNS-and-BIND]

Wow, it's almost like they're domestic media, speaking to a domestic audience, about the national sport. Imagine that!

"It's irritating how US-centric the US media is."

Sorry, I just had to repeat that to laugh at it. The level of entitlement you foreigners have is gargantuan. You expect us to cater to you, but feel no such obligation in reverse. Constant withering criticism whenever we do something for ourselves. Seriously, it got old a long time ago. Build your own tech website and comment on it, Sl

Re:

[Brett Buck]

Money quote:

It's irritating how US-centric the US media is.

Huh? My God, it's almost as if they are writing articles for their target audience! And it is extremely poor writing to attempt to laboriously explain basics of the game of baseball that their target audience already knows like the back of their hands, on the off chance that the rest of the world, outside Japan, might read it.

I wouldn't expect anyone to explain soccer scandals to a US audience - th

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[Aighearach]

That has nothing to do with location, don't be daft grampy.

It has to do with the story only having relevance for people interested in the sport.

They play it in Japan, too. Maybe other places.

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[Tom]

It has to do with the story only having relevance for people interested in the sport.

Corruption in sports is interesting to people interested in sports - but not necessarily in that particular sport, you know?

Re:

[Aighearach]

Right. But you said corruption. That is external. This isn't corruption. This is cheating. This is entirely internal, it is just players and teams cheating within the team.

Corruption generally would be if the league or the umpires or government officials or somebody was doing it.

Hypocrites

[schwit1]

Where was this concern for the game's integrity 20 years ago when records were getting trampled by steroid users? If MLB wants to prove that integrity matters they would remove all statistics and records of players who used PEDs. Hank Aaron and Roger Maris would still be the home run kings..

Re:Hypocrites

[SoCalChris]

This. And "harsh punishment was meted out"? Was it really? They didn't forfeit their championship or really face any harsh financial fines. This was an absolute slap on the wrist to everyone involved, and showed every MLB player, coach and fan that the games are for sale.

Remember when Pete Rose was banned for life from the sport and Hall of Fame because he bet for his team? He didn't throw any games, and he didn't bet against his team. That was a harsh punishment.

Re:

[Aighearach]

Pete Rose got a lifetime ban for being gambling addict, for merely creating the potential appearance of cheating, and now 30 years later a whole team was caught cheating and winning from their cheating, and nobody is being banned, or anything. The league isn't upset about the cheating, they're more upset that some players spoke about it in public!

Baseball is dead, and it might not come back if they don't right their ship soon. If you lose multiple generations of fans your sport falls into history. Bowling

On the other hand ...

[PPH]

... if you attend a game and the media ends up following you around the stands with their cameras, that's not all bad. That's how Pamela Anderson was discovered.

Simpsons

[AndyKron]

Bart Simpson was right!