September 6th
Welcome to the Trippant Takeaways, our new regular selection of recent stories that highlight trends, best practice and provocative ideas in communications across sport, entertainment, technology and culture.
Ryan Reynolds and the National League streaming debate
Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenny have sprinkled Hollywood stardust and charm over the lower reaches of British football since buying Wrexham in 2021. The resulting FX documentary series, Welcome to Wrexham, is making waves worldwide, and the duo have just released a limited-edition rarebit cookbook, which will raise funds for Wrexham food banks and is definitely not just the same recipe 20 times.
But when Reynolds went public to his 20 million Twitter followers about his differences with the National League over live streaming of games, it set two different worldviews on IP, media access and rights ownership on a collision course. The Athletic picks up the story here.
Premier League teams champion local businesses
At the other end of the pyramid, Premier League teams can deliver local and global benefits by championing community businesses – and that could make a real difference as those companies face down the energy crisis. Sam Carp explores the concept further in his always excellent SportsPro sponsorship and marketing newsletter.
Emma Raducanu’s lucrative sponsorships deals
It was an emotional weekend at the US Open as the greatest women’s tennis player of them all, Serena Williams, left the court for the last time.
Earlier in the week, defending champion Emma Raducanu – a great hope for the next generation – had continued a difficult year with a first-round exit. So should her many new brand partners rethink their support? Trippant founder Tom Scott says no. Read the Telegraph article here.
AI humanoids sent to soccer camp
Sport is a brilliant way to demonstrate new technology but it can offer a development angle, too. Alphabet-owned DeepMind has enabled major advances in artificial intelligence by letting its AlphaZero network loose on chess, go and video games. Now, DeepMind has taken its first steps on to the football pitch. Wired has more.
Alexa V potty-mouthed toddlers
Finally, here’s a quick and dirty one from Buzzfeed News. The streaming media ecosystem creates surprise musical success in this tale of potty-mouthed toddlers and their parents’ digital home assistants. Read the Buzzfeed piece here.
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