Football Fans Take on Murdoch's 'Skyvals'

COVENTRY, England, December 20 /PRNewswire/ --     Football Fans are incensed at Sky, following the destruction of a
footballing community, according to bythefans.net. Following a Sky buy-out,
the fan-generated rivals.net has plummeted in the world rankings.

Disquiet amongst independent fanzine editors who run the club pages in
the network has been growing. New contracts were imposed and revenue cuts
tabled. The final straw for many happened on 3rd December, when a new format
for the website was launched, despite the almost unanimous opposition of the
editors. The new format removed the ability for editors to make additional
revenue via shops, has long loading times, and most importantly to the users
of the site, many elements surrounding the functionality of message boards
have been stripped out.

Many have questioned whether or not there has been a deliberate agenda on
behalf of Sky to destroy the Rivals Network, as not only was it previously a
highly-successful competitor, but also it gave a mouthpiece to genuine
football fans, often critical of Sky's influence.

In response, ByTheFans.net was launched on 18th December, with the
intention of giving disgruntled Rivals users and editors a complete
alternative network. The vision is that by the fans will be 'By the fans, for
the fans', not only in terms of content, but also in terms of how the company
is set up and the way the profits are shared out, something seemingly totally
alien to the likes of Sky.

By The Fans founder, Joe Rukin said;

"Three months ago Rivals was ranked as the 6149th website in the world in
the Alexa.com league table. By Saturday, less than a fortnight after the
relaunch, it had dropped to 29,060.That's like a club that was in a UEFA Cup
spot at the start of the season dropping to the middle of the championship.
No-one is happy with what they are doing, and there has been a mass exodus.
Some editors are scared by the perceived threat of legal action, despite the
fact Sky have provided a site which many believe is not fit for purpose."

"The fact that Sky have allowed links to a disparate set of alternative
websites for fans to remain on Rivals, but decided to delete ones from
ByTheFans.net, pointing to a complete alternative due to 'Inappropriate
Content' shows to me that they are happy to see the community broken up, but
do not want to see it kept together."