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Olympic Athletes Requested to Cover Apple Logos During Opening Ceremony Because of Samsung Sponsorship [Updated]

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question fear said:
This is actually insanely common in the Olympics, though Samsung is taking it to a bit of an extreme.

It's actually a huge issue for athletes in less prestige sports because they can't wear their sponsor's logos, which means they can't cash in on being in the Olympics. I remember in the last summer Olympics this was an issue, because runners couldn't even tweet or share that they were sponsored by, say, Adidas, because Nike had a stranglehold on the Olympics.

It's fine for a Lindsey Vonn to be sponsored by, I think, UnderArmor, because they can cash in on her fame long after the Olympics have passed...but if you're not super famous and your ten minutes of fleeting sports glory fall during the Olympics and your sponsor isn't Nike...oh well.
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This is all true but you don't exactly get what this story is about.

Samsung wants Olympics participants to conceal the Apple logo on their personal iPhones/iPads while taking personal pictures and videos during the opening ceremonies, events, etc.

Apple is not a competing sponsor logo as you describe it, it is just a product brand of mobile phone lots of athletes personally use and own. Samsung doesn't want the iconic Apple logo on the back of the iPhone or iPad to be seen on the television broadcast so they are attempting to distort reality.

:D


AppleScruff1 said:
I'm sure that they hope that all athletes would use a Samsung provided phone. It makes perfect business sense.
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True, but what a bummer to be forced into using a sub-par camera to capture one's Olympic memories when there are pros leaving their DSLRs behind for the iPhone 5S.
 
Does anyone happen to know of any of the Twitter handles of some folks on the IOC? I'd love to see if they're all tweeting from Android phones. I have a feeling it we looked at some of their tweets it would resemble the whole Oprah "Gotta love Surface" tweet sent via Twitter for iPad.
 
every iPhone comes with stickers in the box. perhaps they could use those to cover the logo.
 
Illusion986 said:
I understand Samsung wanting athletes not to flash apple and other logos as they are spending loads of money for advertisement and sponsorship....But disqualification? seriously? People are forgetting what olympic games are suppose to be about...very sad

Any one wants to buy my 1 year old samsung TV? anyone? :(
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aerok said:
Wow guys, this is normal practice.

Something similar happened with the first Spiderman movie, where Sony wanted to hide Samsung's logo during the scene that happens in Time Square.

It is a very common practice and I can assure you that any other company would've done the same if they were the main sponsor, including Apple but then again, does Apple ever sponsor anything? Their fault, not Samsung's.
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Samsung are right when they request logos on apparel and equipment to be covered... They can't and shouldn't force people to hide logos from personal products... That is ********...
 
Makes me wonder if Apple would do the same.

Bit sad when you feel that you have to censor your competition.

I understand why they are doing it, but it's for a financial reason; they forgot it looks bad from a PR perspective.
 
Understandable.

Samsung paid a lot of money for sponsorship, why would they want Apple to get free advertising due to Apple's products being on TV?
 
During the last opening ceremonies it was a parade of Apple logos as athletes took pictures during their entrance. Samsung couldn't have liked that.
 
avanpelt said:
Does anyone happen to know of any of the Twitter handles of some folks on the IOC? I'd love to see if they're all tweeting from Android phones. I have a feeling it we looked at some of their tweets it would resemble the whole Oprah "Gotta love Surface" tweet sent via Twitter for iPad.
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Not sure about IOC but this account
https://twitter.com/Olympics
is mostly using a third party app to hide device used.
 
osofast240sx said:
they did do something they requested the rule be enforced publicly. Maybe not such a good idea for them
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Could you please provide a source for this claim? I'm not being a jerk, I just did not see anything that said this. All I saw was a reiteration of the same policy that has always existed. If you show me, I'll stand corrected.
 
If Samsung asked me to do that I would be wearing a apple hat and holding my iPad and iPhone showing only the back wear the apple is!!!!!!!!!! I hate samsung so much!!! And why should anyone care about what they same who made them the boss. Just because they are sponsoring a event that would happen with no funds what so ever doesn't me they can cover up logos not sponsoring. To me if I was concidering a product and herd that I would turn in the other direction and run run as fast as I can. I don't want to be with a company like that.
 
Stella said:
Understandable.

Samsung paid a lot of money for sponsorship, why would they want Apple to get free advertising due to Apple's products being on TV?
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If Samsung's product was more desirable, then giving a free Note 3 to every athlete should automatically lead to a plethora of Samsung logos during the opening ceremonies parade. Now that this story is news it is nothing but bad press for Samsung.
 
aerok said:
Wow guys, this is normal practice.

Something similar happened with the first Spiderman movie, where Sony wanted to hide Samsung's logo during the scene that happens in Time Square.

It is a very common practice and I can assure you that any other company would've done the same if they were the main sponsor, including Apple but then again, does Apple ever sponsor anything? Their fault, not Samsung's.
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Excuse me, but we have a situation here where the world's greatest athletes could be banned from participating in the Olympic games for using their phones. How can anyone call this "normal"?
 
gatearray said:
True, but what a bummer to be forced into using a sub-par camera to capture one's Olympic memories when there are pros leaving their DSLRs behind for the iPhone 5S.
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Where is the idea that athletes are being forced to use Samsung phones coming from? And an iPhone is not a replacement for a DSLR. I'll bet we see lots of white Canon lenses taking pics. I don't think an iPhone can take the same quality photo as a Canon 5D MkIII using a 400mm f2.8L lens.
 
Stella said:
Understandable.

Samsung paid a lot of money for sponsorship, why would they want Apple to get free advertising due to Apple's products being on TV?
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Apple will still get the advertisement, just covering the logo will not get it done.
 
Stella said:
Understandable.

Samsung paid a lot of money for sponsorship, why would they want Apple to get free advertising due to Apple's products being on TV?
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Because that's what people are using. It's the truth. Samsung only sponsored because they know no one there will be using a samsung.
 
Rogifan said:
I maybe get this with respect to clothing or equipment companies but outside of that it seems like a stupid rule. If someone doesn't use a Samsung phone it's stupid to make them pretend they do for two weeks. Plus how many athletes want to spend time fiddling around with a new phone during the Olympics? That's the last thing I'd want to spend my time doing.
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I really doubt that there will be active enforcement, but I know that if I spent millions of $ sponsoring an event and there were advertisements for a competitor everywhere, I would think twice about spending my money that way.

I think the IOC wants to promote to sponsors that their products will be prominent and that their competitor's won't be. And I can understand that logic.
 
BC2009 said:
During the last opening ceremonies it was a parade of Apple logos as athletes took pictures during their entrance. Samsung couldn't have liked that.
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Apparently athletes preferred iPhones to Samsung phones. But then it is widely known that Samsung outspends anyone in the marketing department. The only way to make athletes not use their iPhones is to threaten them with not being able to compete.
 
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