FanDome Gives Sports Fans a Richer YouTube-like Environment

By Andrew Lippe
Is FanDome.com, a new Website that allows fans to upload video highlights of their favorite college or professional teams, destined to become embroiled in the same copyright controversies that swirled around YouTube? Only weeks into its existence, and with 40,000 video clips already on the site, the answer most likely is yes, despite the best intentions of FanDome.com executives.
“I felt there was an opportunity to build a community around sharing sports content and the greatest opportunity was in college,” says Ricky Joshi, FanDome’s chief strategic officer. “I think a lot of other sites have failed in trying to attack the college market because they haven’t been content-centric.”
A passion for Ohio State football led the co-creators to launch the site. “As a huge Ohio State fan, I really found myself scouring the Web to try to find every last video at the team level,” says Joshi. “I wanted the behind-the-scenes stuff that you could only get in Columbus.”
FanDome includes a network of more than 600 sports-team communities at both the professional and collegiate level, including the flagship Ohio State University community, “buckeyedome.”
FanDome has more than 40,000 categorized sports videos that can be watched by fans via Adobe Flash. Fans post clips from their favorite teams or events, but the site is in the process of creating hub channels over the next two months where media companies can provide their own content. “We are making it easier for professional content creators to participate,” says Joshi.
FanDome.com allows users to post video highlights from TV broadcasts, although all videos are subject to being removed if a TV rightsholder or league objects. The NBA, for example, has already requested videos be taken down.
FanDome also allows fans to blog, share online articles, and vote on clips using a “thumbs-up” or “thumbs-down” rating. FanDome has also integrated with Facebook Connect so all activities that fans participate in on FanDome will show on users’ Facebook pages.
FanDome is continuing to grow. Fans will soon be able to upload sports clips directly to the site from their mobile devices. “At the end of the day,” says Joshi, “it is all about sharing content.”