Hanging Out on the Internet Street Corner

A spokesman for the Drake Group, a collection of academicians who help faculty and staff defend academic integrity in the face of the burgeoning college sport industry, has criticized the decision by the University of Iowa to purchase seven domain names that could be used to criticize athletic department officials.

"This situation at Iowa is, in my opinion, farcical and tells me the Iowa A.D. must spend way too much time monitoring these sites," Richard Southall, Assistant Professor, Health and Sport Sciences at the University of Memphis, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

"They must protect their power and will do just about anything to control messages. Staying on message and controlling the dialogue is widespread in college sport.

"Iowa's A.D. and the athletic department figure that if you prevent rabble-rousers from hanging out on the Internet street corner, they won't be able to build any critical mass. Messages, as any marketer will tell you, have the potential to change people's behaviors and affect their buying decisions. Evidently, they must think it's safer to just throw some money at the problem and it'll go away."

Some registration. Thanks to Marty of cfbstats.com.