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>View discussions about this entry Country: Germany
Organization: Spirit of Football
Sport - Soccer
Year the initative began (yyyy) - 1998
YouTube Upload - Place your video embed code here from YouTube, Google Video and other video sharing websites. How to embed a video from YouTube.
Project URL: http://www.spiritoffootball.com/
Positioning in the Mosaic of solutions
What is your signature innovation, your new idea, in one sentence? - The Spirit of Football is football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch - a legendary football and the star of the beautiful game.
Describe your innovation. What makes your idea unique and different than others doing work in the field? - Every four years, The Ball sets out from England - where the first game of FA rules football was played - and travels overland to the Opening Ceremony of the World Cup. The Ball explores and celebrates how football enriches peoples' lives and brings their stories to the attention of the world. In doing so, it connects people directly to the World Cup - for as long as there is a World Cup.
In 2010, The Ball and the Spirit of Football team will make an 8000 mile pilgrimage to South Africa. The team will include entertainers and footballers, who travel with a simple goal - to show the spirit of the beautiful game. Sustainable Participatory Video (PV) projects in NGOs en route give local people a chance to tell their own stories. These stories, combined with The Ball's investigation of local football culture and visits to festivals of football, music and dance, create a travelling legend – the Spirit of Football. In 2014 the focus falls on the Americas as The Ball travels to Brazil. What are the existing barriers, the biggest problem, your innovation is hoping to address/change? - Football coverage focuses mainly on the professional game and hooliganism. But there are wonderful projects all over the world making a difference using football. Most do not get the publicity - and thus the funding - that they deserve. The stereotype of Africa is of a continent riven by war, disease and poverty. By giving local people the means to tell their own stories, audiences become aware of the variety of African life, and some of those stereotypes can be dispelled.
Delivery Model: How do you implement your innovation and apply it to the challenge/problem you are addressing? - The Ball makes an overland journey to the World Cup, seeking out human interest stories. The team travelling with The Ball documents the action, uploading video, audio, photos and stories to the website.
The Ball visits projects that use football to promote social, health and community issues. We select and place students as interns in these projects, which lie along The Ball’s route. The students, trained by fellow changemakers Insight in PV, enable people to tell their stories in their own words. The Ball celebrates the positive aspects of fan culture at festivals of football, music and dance, where The Ball is played with and signed by all the people who help it on its way. The media produced on the trip is fun, informative and educational - for broadcast and for use online and in schools. People learn about the football, history, culture, music and geography of the countries that The Ball passes through. Positive stories about Africa are transmitted to a world wide audience. How do you plan to grow your innovation? - We want to bring together a network of organisations across all sectors to pool resources to enable dynamic social change. We aim to be funded by public and private partners. The EU, national governments and the Uni of Erfurt can fund the placement of students. The trip can be sponsored by private firms and sold to broadcasters while media partnerships ensure the coverage reaches a wide audience.
We plan to work with Insight - who we have teamed up with through this competition - to develop PV hubs in Africa. Insight give intensive training in PV to interns who work closely with NGOs and their communities before The Ball arrives - creating videos that are shared with the global community. We would like The Ball's arrival to kick off the Opening Ceremony of the World Cup. The Ball represents fair play and tolerance, and echoes the toast by which the FA was formed in 1863: "To football irrespective of class or creed". We want to add "race" and "gender" to that declaration. Provide one sentence describing your impact/intended impact. - The Ball celebrates the role that football plays in people's lives and shares those insights by interconnecting its audience into a global community.
What impact has your innovation had to date/or what is your intended impact? Exactly who are the beneficiaries? - The Ball's 8000 mile journey across Europe, Central Asia and China in 2002 saw it kicked and signed by footballers, Tibetan monks, British ambassadors and highlighted on CNN. The Ball continues to connect people, organisations and countries directly to the World Cup and ensures that they benefit from that connection. The football community benefits by connecting with the grassroots. Our media partners get compelling content in the run up to the cup and our sponsors are socially responsible.
We add value to NGOs by giving them much needed exposure and allowing them to tell their own stories in their own words. We visit gender and socially inclusive projects, learn about football being used to promote human rights, and to combat diseases like HIV/AIDS. Our interns become changemakers - managing projects that empower and equip others with the skills to make a real difference. The potential impact of The Ball is enormous because football engages the emotions and attention of the world.
Please list any other measures reflective of the impact of your innovation? - SOF can be more than just a film and podcast, it can be as spectacular as the Olympic Torch itself. The content generated is suitable for multiple distribution channels - for the commuter watching an episode on their mobile device on their way to work; for the football fan watching on digital TV; for BBC World Service radio programming; for the teacher to download and show in the classroom; and - we hope - for the official coverage of the Opening Ceremony of the World Cup.
What are the main barriers to creating or achieving your impact? - It is vital to find partners to play the roles necessary to make the 2010 project a success. The trip is arduous and costly, and for long intervals crosses remote areas. We depend on vehicles, local conditions, technology and people. We need technology investment and research on the ground to ensure we have the connectivity we need. Preparation will be vital and requires funding. We have a team raring to go but they need support. Finally, The Ball might burst. We carry a spare, of course.
How is your initiative financed (or how do you expect your initiative will be financed)? - Spirit of Football is currently privately financed, although we have been paid for TV and radio appearances and have sold images from the 2002 journey. We are currently supported by Films@59 who host the video files of the 2002 and 2006 trips. We have a 55 minute documentary that can be licensed for broadcast. We are collaborating with the University of Erfurt on feasibility studies and are writing a proposal for funding for the student placement project.
For 2010, 2014 and beyond, these are some of the possibilities: content sold to print and broadcast media, mobile networks and online services; text voting; sponsorship; public money; philanthropists; Football Associations including FIFA; and adidas, who make the official World Cup ball. If known, provide information on your finances and organization. - Please list: Annual budget, annual revenue generated, size of part-time, full-time and volunteer staff. Annual budget: next to nil
Annual revenue generated: next to nil Number of staff What is the potential demand for your innovation? - In 2010, the entire African continent will be alive with expectation at hosting the FIFA World Cup for the first time. A legendary football travelling the length of Africa revealing that excitement will fire the imagination of the world.
From football fans to football associations, from education providers en route (and around the world) to partner NGOs in need of publicity, from media audiences to sponsors looking to connect with the grassroots, The Ball is for the benefit of them all. What are the main barriers to financial sustainability? - At present, we have little income and no paid staff and therefore survive through the efforts of our dedicated volunteers. Our structure is in need of formalisation and the episodic nature of the project may make it difficult to sustain partnerships in the "down time" between World Cups. Each journey of The Ball is to different parts of the world and will require many new partnerships, involve new media innovations and new educational possibilities.
What is the origin of this innovation? Tell us your story. - Three people bring you this story. It starts with two. In 1998, Phil Wake and Christian Wach went to the World Cup in France to record the songs and celebrations of the supporters. They were captivated by the power that music had to bring rival fans together - and discovered through kickabouts that football truly is a global language. Regardless of the outcome on the field of play, they saw people from all over the world come together to celebrate life through football.
Infected by the World Cup bug, they planned a trip to Korea and Japan overland - using a football as their passport to games with local people. Setting off from England, the birthplace of the modern game, they suddenly realised that their ball could become a legend - it was "The Ball", football's equivalent to the Olympic torch. In 2006, Andrew Aris contacted Christian. He had formed a non-profit association in Erfurt, Germany, also called Spirit of Football. The Ball came to Erfurt during the 2006 World Cup and was the guest of honour at a 24 hour Football Against Racism marathon. Now they are working together with student teams from the University of Erfurt to help launch the project. The 2002 trip also had a personal dimension, providing Christian with a chance to find his grandfather's grave. Born in America, his grandfather died stationed with the Polish Army in Uzbekistan. In 2010, Christian hopes to visit his grandmother's grave, also a Polish refugee, who is buried at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro. Please provide a personal bio. Note this may be used in Changemakers marketing material. - Andrew Aris is football mad and played for New Zealand and the University of Notre Dame in the USA. In 2000 he moved to Amsterdam for EURO 2000. In 2002, living in Korea, he vividly lived the power of the World Cup. In 2005 he interned at the World Cup Organising Committee, graduated with an MPP and founded Spirit of Football e.V. In 2006 he and his students used football to fight racism and he met Christian and Phil. He wants to dedicate his life to helping them implement their vision.
Contact Information:
Andrew Aris
Eternal Optimist Spirit of Football (Other - emergent) andrew@spiritoffootball.com Gustav Freytag Strasse 60 Erfurt Thüringen Germany Tel: 0049 176 60 888 706 Website: http://www.spiritoffootball.com Discussions about this entry |
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Hi Guys and hi Kitso!
Great stuff and I love your videoblog at spiritoffootball.com with the little films made along the way. You've got a great concept and a dedicated, skilled & passionate team of you working on this. Im really looking forward to integrating participatory video into this model, i think it will add a whole extra dimension. Be great to get more participant involvement and hear their stories along the way. We are also talking about proper capacity builiding in this PV tool, so that we leave behind the skills and tools for local groups to continue using this powerful tool for community engagement, mobilization and advocacy. Insight is currently developing a PV web platform, like a kind of youtube for community video and voices & action...or a social networking site for the majority world (not just web based - also using mobile phones & DVD exchange)...I see so much value we can add to each others initiatives! Our work together will be a testament to the power of collaboration and we met thanks to changemakers...so we are all winners already! Anyway good luck with the upcoming judging! I know we will be in touch soon.
Chris
Director of Insight
To know more about Participatory video see our entry: youth video - fuel to power a sports for change movement
Andrew,
exciting entry there, well laid out and beautifull. I am touched by the passion that your program was initiated on. looks set for a promising future and I agree the changemakers platform will for sure link you to sport for development programs globally and that would help you create links with these organizations.
Hey Kitso,
thanks for the message. You know yourself that such projects must be based on passion. We have a really passionate team that strongly believes in The Ball's social potential. We are really looking forward to continuing to develop our initiative with you.
Lets take our collaboaration further in the coming months and years. Wouldn't it be great if we could send Spirit of Football interns trained by insight in PV to work with you in the lead up to the World Cup in 2010!
Keep up the good work my friend.
Cheers,
Andrew.
Andrew Aris
Lecturer University of Erfurt
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Spirit of Football - football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
Andrew,
I think the ball represents peace and fairness that we will all love to see around the globe, connecting communities and nations together, regardless of the race. much emphasis has been put on professional football and the winning concept, which kills the spirit of the game. You are very right, there are sports organization around the world that use the power of sport to enhance lives and often they are been overlooked and not supported. Your collaboration with insight is fantastic, I have personally did the introduction to PV training with Chris and Sara from insight and I have seen the impact it has on the locals, so it is a great network and having you working with us using PV to catalyse local action sounds great.
Hi SOF team,
Great to read your proposal and all the comments surrounding it. I head up an NGO with five bases across Africa. Our focus is football outreach and community devleopment through football. Obviously 2010 is high on our agenda and we're involved in a number of projects and programmes in South Africa and across the Continent. We're also partnering with many organisations in preparation for 2010 so was wondering if there is any scope for being involved in your project - and perhaps also tying you in with a few of the other 2010 initiatives that we are aware of.
Keep up the good work.
Tim Tucker
Ambassadors in Sport
Pretoria, South Africa.
Dear Tim,
Firstly let me apologize that our reply has taken so long.
Thanks a lot for your input and suggestions. We are developing our project internally as well as with external partners and we would welcome your input and we would like to hear more about your plans for 2010. You also mention you are working with a number of other initiatives in 2010, please inform us about those - we are eager to hear.
We are interested in working together with a variety of partners in many different countries to be able to give a full picture of the positive power of football in the places we visit.
Thanks again for getting in touch and once more sorry for taking so long to reply.
Best regards,
Andrew Aris
Lecturer University of Erfurt
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Spirit of Football - football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
Thank you for your reponse~!
The team has a couple of more observations and questions. The initiative is indeed very ‘symbolic’, do you think that the "movement" ought to reach people other than the current population of football fanatics? And how to you reach populations without YouTube access??
This is along the lines of my previous question, you mention “collaboration” – what does this collaboration consist of? What are your goals in these collaborations? How are you working to turn these collaboration into demonstrative social impacts. The initiative is potentially reaching a mass population through this marketing, but what are the next steps to create social change??
Thanks again,
Changemakers Team
Thanks for getting back to us - we appreciate your feedback. Here are our answers to each of your questions in turn.
You ask: The initiative is indeed very ‘symbolic’, do you think that the "movement" ought to reach people other than the current population of football fanatics?
The project has always sought to reach out beyond football - indeed our experience has been that the films and the trip itself appeal to many people who genuinely dislike football. During our journeys we found that people embraced the simplicity of a bouncing ball and some basic rules - we actually played one game in the Kyrgyz mountains with people who had never played football before. The films are both relevant in terms of football, but also in personal and cultural terms - we have been constantly surprised by their power to inspire even the most non-sporting of people. We hope that the media generated by the forthcoming trip will engage people that love football as well as those that do not.
You ask: How to you reach populations without YouTube access??
We believe that access to YouTube (or any other internet video service) will be considerably easier in 2010, but we are by no means relying on this as a distribution medium or as our sole means of engaging people. We would ideally have TV, radio and mobile phone syndication, a publishing deal and educational curriculums alongside any internet distribution.
On the ground in Africa, our local partners will have spread the word before our arrival and so our festival occasions should draw large crowds. We have already had an offer from one prospective partner to arrange for musicians to compose celebratory songs in honour of The Ball at a football, music and dance festival that they will organise in their country.
We would like to show the films from previous trips (and from previous countries on the 2010 trip) at those festivals. The vast majority of the people that The Ball encounters will never have the opportunity to go to a World Cup game - this is perhaps the closest they will ever get to be a part of the world's greatest sporting event.
You ask: This is along the lines of my previous question, you mention “collaboration” – what does this collaboration consist of?
We're a little bit confused by what you mean here - we only mention "collaboration" in terms of our relationship with the University of Erfurt. At present, Andrew is running a course there which students participate in. They have been doing vital research focussing on our proposed trip route and building a substantial database of contacts - media organisations, football- and sport-related NGOs and other relevant information. They are also developing an education plan and helping us to devise a strategy to take the project forward.
Is this what you were referring to, or are you referring to the partnerships that we are hoping to establish - and the collaborations we pursue with them? If so, on the most fundamental level, we want to add value to each project that we visit through offering them the oxygen of publicity. Each project is itself causing social change and we seek to act as a catalyst to speed up the rate of that change.
We look forward to your clarification,
Best wishes,
Christian
(on behalf of the SOF team)
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Christian Wach
Spirit of Football - football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
Thank you Chris for your response, I need to clarify my last question. I think we were curious about what you say here:
We add value to a variety of existing organisations by giving them much needed exposure. We visit gender and socially inclusive projects, investigate football being used to promote human rights, to combat diseases like HIV/AIDS and to equip young and old people with life skills. The learning potential of The Ball in schools, universities and elsewhere is enormous because football engages the emotions and attention of a diverse audience.
And we are curious how you will ensure a community wide social change from your project, as you allude to in that paragraph. Aside from the marketing perspective for the World Cup, do you have any specific plans to have a social impact in a systematic manner?
Thank you again and I look forward to your response,
Changemakers Team
Hi Tyler,
Thanks for your continued interest in our project. Apologies that it's taken so long for us to get back to you. You raise some valid and important issues.
Firstly, we must stress that Spirit of Football is by no means an attempt to establish a marketing tool for the World Cup. The World Cup is already the world's greatest sporting event, and we seek to use its vastly popular profile to add value to worthwhile organisations.
The list in the paragraph that you single out details the kinds of organisations that we wish to be of service to. It is intended to give a flavour of the possibilities on the epic journey of 2010. We set out below some of the ways in which we think our project will have a social impact, but we also believe that by helping those who are already doing great work, our project will inevitably promote social change.
Furthermore, we plan to use a variety of means to further the social impact of the project, for which there was not enough space in our entry to detail thoroughly. We want to employ participative video techniques to document the projects we cover in Africa. We would like to use social networking technologies to link schools and communities in Africa with schools and communities in the rest of the world. And lastly, we intend to raise money for and offer ways to donate footballs and mosquito nets to projects and communities on our route.
The final element of Spirit of Football - and the one that could have the most impact - is the plan for an education initiative that can be supported by and integrated with all the elements we mention above. There are two strands to this: the first of which is a curriculum that can be deployed in schools. Although we do not have the capacity to deliver this curriculum ourselves, we are looking at outsourcing it to the relevant education authorities in various target countries. The second strand will involve the festival-style events that will be staged in the countries we visit.
The education initiative brings all the elements of what we are doing together. The media that we produce, the people we meet, the projects we visit and the games we play all further the cause of international understanding and cooperation, and help to inspire people, particularly the young, to reach beyond their limits.
The SOF Team
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Spirit of Football - football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
Hello-
Your proposal is very vivid and compelling- it seems your goals and passions are right in line with the goals of this contest. As someone invited to be a "faculty commentator" I tend to read these with an eye for finding what might be missing even when there is great content- so please indulge the focus here. It seems you have plans in many directions- you seek a variety of partnerships and see a variety of potential side projects and/or potential funders. My first reaction is to suggest that you refine your idea by tightening your focus and goals. I can tell from your writing and your obvious passion (and the fact that you have three principals!) that it would be hard for you to "eliminate" any one potential goal/partner/funder so my second suggestion would be to at least indicate for the reader a hierarchy of goals and effects. For example, as written, it is hard to see where I would use this as an educator because I can't tell the focus of the proposal: is it foremost about educating people (so suggests educational partnerships and funding sources first), or is it foremost about travel, or about fan integration and peacemaking through sports, or is it foremost about social networking with purposefully no focus on where that networking goes? Etc.
Again, I realize you may want it to be about many of these, but providing a hierarchy and a realistic sense of which of these you would do best (and when and where) would certainly strengthen your proposal and would allow you to send a stronger signal (and offer greater value) to many of the potential partners you seek.
Looking forward to seeing the ball in chapel hill one day...
Best,
Lisa Jones Christensen
UNC Chapel Hill
Hi Lisa,
Thanks for your insightful comments - they have given us real food for thought in terms of how we will update our proposal. Indeed, we've been discussing the implications of what you suggest for the past week. For us, entering this competition was always about engaging in the process of discussion, comment and comparison in order to help our ideas crystallise. We're glad you find our content "vivid and compelling"!
Andrew is the organiser of the education initiative, I am the website developer and media specialist, while Phil is the force behind the interactions of The Ball on its journey to the World Cup. As you have correctly identified, we have tried to make the proposal reflect each of the areas that we are individually passionate about. At the moment, we make decisions collectively and so no one idea takes precedence - but perhaps over time a hierarchy will emerge.
In that sense, we'd like to mimic the open source movement in the development of this project. It seems that most open source initiatives are a melting pot of agendas and that the outcome of such initiatives cannot be accurately predicted in advance. The organsational model is "bottom-up" and emergent rather than "top-down" and prescriptive - just like a game of football - and we welcome any coaching that may be offered!
Christian Wach
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Spirit of Football - football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
A fantastic programme i said i just want to comment on how,someone can make your team because i individually i love sport particularly football is my best sport right from my childhood my love for football is both physical and mental love i have thanks very much from adebayo i love you all
Hi Adebayo,
Thanks for your interest in the project - glad you like the programme. Your question is one we have been asking ourselves too. As yet, we don't yet know exactly how the team will be selected. We have several ideas about what we would like to see happen, but are also open to any suggestions.
Christian Wach
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Spirit of Football - football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
Dear Tyler,
Thank you for your comments. We are delighted that you like the videos and see the point of our project.
We have already developed some partnerships for the 2010 project, but there are many more connections to be made and partnerships to be developed. That is why we are here at Changemakers - to make connections, to get essential feedback and hopefully to form those partnerships.
The organisations that we have been coming across in our research are continually opening our minds to new ideas and amazing stories - inspirational stories that show us the power of football for social change. I received an e-mail a few minutes ago from a potential partner – it oozes with joy – his organisation just received 100 footballs donated by FIFA. Last week they were in rural areas donating the balls to primary schools and youth organisations. These are the kinds of projects and people whose stories we want to tell.
Tyler, you are right, our ultimate goal is that our ball, The Ball, is welcomed into the Opening Ceremony like the Olympic Flame and we would be delighted if The Ball were to become an official part of the World Cup.
Spirit of Football - football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch
http://www.spiritoffootball.com
The sights that we see through the YouTube videos that you present here are amazing and indeed it is wonderful to see the ball travel through the world as well as for the little history lesson. It is indeed very inspiring!
You mention that you were able to link up with so many fascinating organizations that use football in their work. How have these partnerships helped you all frame this traveling football into a mini-movement? What is your ultimate goal, to have the traveling ball to become an official part of the World Cup? I can see this being a great part of the World Cup marketing not only to promote their games but also to include the great social benefit that the sport brings to people world wide.
Thank you for your response!
Tyler Ahn
Changemakers