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New Ways to Deliver the News

By Mark Pope

Fort Wayne Reader

2006-12-05

The ways in which people receive their news are changing dramatically. Traditional newspaper and magazine subscriptions are diminishing. Replacing these outmoded means of news dissemination are specialty, localized newspapers, cable broadcasts, the Internet, emails, Instant Messaging, ipods, text messages, wireless alerts, blogs, cell phone cameras and countless other 21st-Century methods of delivering specialized information.

At IPFW Athletics, we have just begun to explore these various delivery systems as a way to provide greater access for our fans. We have successfully launched our new website, www.gomastodons.com, which takes us out of the “.edu” domain and into the commercial Internet arena. We can now do things that we could not do before.

The first of these is to broadcast our sporting events over the Internet. By going to http://gomastodons.cstv.com/multimedia/ipfw-multimedia.html, anyone in the world can listen to any IPFW Men’s or Women’s Basketball broadcast. And, with IPFW Basketball Student-Athletes from the Bahamas, Kosovo, Croatia, Germany, Belgium and Norway, it’s important that we stretch our broadcasts far beyond Northeast Indiana. We will be able to lock onto video broadcasts of our games from other venues and bring them to our fans. We will solicit opinions from those who visit our Internet site, so that we can make the changes that they want us to make. The list of possibilities is only limited by our own imaginations.

But, no matter how well we develop these devices, there is still nothing like attending a game! The experience of attending an NCAA Division 1 athletic event is unable to be duplicated by the best HDTV technology. To that end, we are bringing a real Holiday Treat to Fort Wayne: The Second Annual HOOPLA, Celebrating Women in Basketball takes place on Sunday afternoon, December 10, at the Gates Center on the IPFW campus. Four of the Top 100 Women’s Basketball Teams in the nation will compete that day, and all with a Hoosier Flavor. At 1:00, Valparaiso will battle Ball State, while the 3:30 game features IPFW against Indiana University. What a great opportunity to see the best on NCAA Women’s Basketball, all up close and personal at the Gates Center! With tickets at just $5, it’s an incredible bargain for Fort Wayne.

We hope you’ll follow us on the web whenever you have the chance, but don’t let that personal experience of an NCAA Basketball game pass you by! Here are some of our upcoming games:

Team Opponent Date Time Where

Women Central Michigan 12/2 2:00 Gates
Men Kent State 12/9 2:00 Coliseum
Women Indiana 12/10 3:30 Gates
Men Marygrove 12/18 7:00 Coliseum