Mod. Notice Official Western Bulldogs Club Account on Big Footy

[Dogs_R_Us]

Is that thread for real? As in, the Club is definitely rebranding the footy club at the end of 2012? If so, a big thumbs up from me!

You've leapt to conclusions with both feet. Try reading the whole thread. These are simply people having fun designing logos. Nothing to do with the club. Sit back and enjoy our new jumper, that's probably all you're going to get.

Don't expect OfficialBulldogs to get involved in any of our frequent controversies, or to comment on players or games or club personnel. I doubt we will get anything from them that we wouldn't find out anyway through our "usual sources".

 

[NagoyaDog]

You've leapt to conclusions with both feet. Try reading the whole thread. These are simply people having fun designing logos. Nothing to do with the club. Sit back and enjoy our new jumper, that's probably all you're going to get

Really? What about this?

"Hey All,

The Western Bulldogs will be doing a re-branding at the end of the 2012 season. Heading the Re-Branding is the Chief Commercial Officer, Nick Truelson. I know Nick and I have already sent in a proposal and was wondering if anyone else would be interested. Send me a P-M of your email and I’ll send you a brief. Must act soon but as the AFL needs a lot of time to approve stuff like this and it can take up to 12 months."

 

[Dogs_r_barking]

Sounds like censorship to me. Social media is a two way street.

No, it's not, if I were to say to you that I think you are an f$#@%*&^ tosser who doesn't know one of his A#$%# from the other, it's one thing, or if I say I disagree with what you just said on the basis of A), B) and C) is quite another.

Big difference.

 

[Unnamed1]

No, it's not, if I were to say to you that I think you are an f$#@%*&^ tosser who doesn't know one of his A#$%# from the other, it's one thing, or if I say I disagree with what you just said on the basis of A), B) and C) is quite another.

Big difference.

Well in that case there's already enough monitoring and the mods need do no more than is already being done, regardless of an "official western bulldogs club account"

 

[Curly5]

Really? What about this?

"Hey All,

The Western Bulldogs will be doing a re-branding at the end of the 2012 season. Heading the Re-Branding is the Chief Commercial Officer, Nick Truelson. I know Nick and I have already sent in a proposal and was wondering if anyone else would be interested. Send me a P-M of your email and I’ll send you a brief. Must act soon but as the AFL needs a lot of time to approve stuff like this and it can take up to 12 months."

Can OfficialBulldogs confirm or deny? What kind of re-branding?

 

[josh the gent]

Can't help you on that one sorry, it's the Club's policy not to disclose the terms and conditions of player and staff contracts. No different to many other workplaces.

I can provide some light about Mulligan, by reference to the AFL Q.

http://www.aflq.com.au/index.php?id=424

Clearly when he was rookie upgraded at the end of 2009, his new contract was announced as 2 years.

Not sure why the club cannot talk about the contact lengths, given they are almost always disclosed at the time of signing.

Mulligan must be on thin ice - great size but lacking footy smarts and out of contract...

 

[Interloper]

Feedback for Official Dog
Clarification please. On 19th September in an article entitled “We got our man – McCartney announced Senior Coach” posted on the Western Bulldogs website, the Western Bulldogs did disclose the term of McCartney’s contract as being 3 years. Is McCartney not considered to be staff or is the length of his contract not considered to be part of the terms of his contract?

I think a week is a reasonable amount of time to wait for a response to the above so I conclude that one is not going to be forthcoming. The conclusion I reach then is that Official Bulldogs presence here is little more than “good news presence” in “space” and that OB will add little of consequence to any interesting discussions and speculation, other than the immediacy of an official position, which will be available on the website anyway.
It’s to be expected that in a forum like this people, from time to time, are going to ask questions that either aren’t convenient or are potentially embarrassing for someone. Pretending the question wasn’t asked is one way of dealing with it I suppose but there’ll be plenty here, I imagine, who’ll find the non-response response inadequate.
As a side note, I don’t really see the problem with announcing lengths of contract universally and I don’t think anyone’s asking for more information than that. From a forum perspective, it takes some of the guess work out of the delisting and trade debates. Bulldogs seem happy enough to announce contract lengths when there’s a positive publicity angle in it, so I would hesitate to call it a policy (policy implying consistency).

 

[Mahama]

Bulldogs seem happy enough to announce contract lengths when there’s a positive publicity angle in it

I believe you just answered your own question, and it is the obvious answer. Do you really take issue with them doing this?
I don't think that the casual curiousity of supporters is enough reason to compulsorily announce every single player's contract length to the public.

 

[Interloper]

I believe you just answered your own question, and it is the obvious answer. Do you really take issue with them doing this?
I don't think that the casual curiousity of supporters is enough reason to compulsorily announce every single player's contract length to the public.

I don’t suggest that it should be compulsory for them to announce contract lengths, even though I don’t particularly see a problem with the public knowing. And as you suggest, my knowing or not knowing is not compelling enough to be the determining factor. My issue is not with whether they do or don’t but rather the blanket claim that it is policy that they don’t disclose when that is not the case.

 

[kookadog]

I don’t suggest that it should be compulsory for them to announce contract lengths, even though I don’t particularly see a problem with the public knowing. And as you suggest, my knowing or not knowing is not compelling enough to be the determining factor. My issue is not with whether they do or don’t but rather the blanket claim that it is policy that they don’t disclose when that is not the case.

The policy of avoiding negative publicity is understandable, disclosing the contract lengths of new signings is positive. publicly discussing who may or may not be in the gun for delisting is completely different.

The non-contract status and whether a player will be retained should be a private matter until a final decision is made.

 

[Unnamed1]

The policy of avoiding negative publicity is understandable, disclosing the contract lengths of new signings is positive. publicly discussing who may or may not be in the gun for delisting is completely different.

The non-contract status and whether a player will be retained should be a private matter until a final decision is made.

The final decision was made on Stack, lodged at the AFL, and not disclosed to members either on the website or using the "Official" BF alias.. hrmm..

 

[Gridlock'd]

Just saw on Facebook that Jason McCartney has joined the Bulldogs in a development role. Any truth to this?

 

[VitalDread]

Just saw on Facebook that Jason McCartney has joined the Bulldogs in a development role. Any truth to this?

He is a List Manager for us

 

[dogwatch]

Poor old OB could be on a hiding to nothing here. Some of our expectations may be too high.

What Ant said in the OP was (my emphasis):

Posting as OfficialBulldogs, representatives from the Bulldogs will be joining in with discussions and answering questions where appropriate.

Please bear with us while we work out the best way to run this, but once it's going it should be a great way for us all to have more contact with our club, and our club with us.
​

And OB himself (or herself?) merely said:

Thanks for the welcome. We look forward to keeping all Bulldogs fans on BigFooty in the loop with the happenings at the Club going forward.
​

Perhaps more significantly the OB post also said:

And if you have any feedback about our work in the digital space, or something you'd like to see more or less of, feel free to contact the Digital Dog at digitaldog@westernbulldogs.com.au .
​

There have been a few critical posts in this thread (and one or two of them with good reason IMO) but let's give the experiment some time to work. More importantly how can it be made better?

Reading through the posts here are some of the better suggestions or implications so far:

• If the club doesn't want to answer or comment on a legitimate, direct question can we have a standard line like "unable to comment at this stage" rather than stony silence which makes everybody suspicious or cynical?

• Go beyond the usual media spin and PR releases - try to engage the members on a more personal or anecdotal level - perhaps give some insights into the WB workings behind the news stories.
• Supporters should be patient - the OB input should prove much more useful when the footy season gets under way.
• Can we have progress reports on the younger players? (who otherwise don't get much coverage)

One problem I can see is that some "questions" are rhetorical (i.e. they were asked in order to make a point and do not expect an answer, e.g. "how could you stoop so low?") while some others could be loaded (e.g. "have you stopped beating your wife yet?") and some are clearly just a bit of harmless fun (like Gus's attempt to get drafted). If we ask questions like those then you can hardly blame the club for not responding.

It's too early to say for sure (let's give it 6-8 months) but I'm starting to agree with Interloper - the main opportunity may be in promoting positive news stories and sorting out minor membership hassles while staying away from more controversial questions that probe or challenge the strategic decisions of the club. I doubt they can be handled effectively through a forum like this.

It might disappoint a few here, but it's still better than no engagement at all.

 

[bontshow]

How much does digital dog know about the club? Is he able to pose our questions to the coach or other personnel?

 

[Curly5]

I don't think OB can say anything the club wouldn't want seized upon by prowling journalists and blown out of proportion in the media. If anyone is expecting any insider info not already common knowledge then they are going to be disappointed.

Even a "no comment" can be used against the club.

I agree with others who've given the opinion that OB will be used for positive or promotional input, or administrative assistance.

 

[josh the gent]

@ OfficialBulldogs

Given our pre-season work in NZ last year, and the trend of AFL clubs looking to capitalise on the benefits of altitude training, has the club looked at entering into a sporting partnership with the Otago Highlanders?

It would be very beneficial for us if we could use their facilities in Queenstown in our pre-season, and build training at altitude. Would also provide an easy to use (NZ-base) in our round 11 bye. Not sure what we could offer in return, but I am sure something could be cooked up.

Plus, if you look at their history (no premierships since 1996 foundation), they have a similar lack of success as we do.

Maybe we could even look at building our fanbase a little in NZ too, and even play 1 game per year over there, rather than interstate where we really get nothing out of the deal except AFL cash (surely not many new members have signed up from Darwin in 2007-09)...

 

[Bulldog Brent]

@ OfficialBulldogs

Given our pre-season work in NZ last year, and the trend of AFL clubs looking to capitalise on the benefits of altitude training, has the club looked at entering into a sporting partnership with the Otago Highlanders?

It would be very beneficial for us if we could use their facilities in Queenstown in our pre-season, and build training at altitude. Would also provide an easy to use (NZ-base) in our round 11 bye. Not sure what we could offer in return, but I am sure something could be cooked up.

Plus, if you look at their history (no premierships since 1996 foundation), they have a similar lack of success as we do.

Why on earth should we try and match up with unsuccessful clubs!?!

 

[josh the gent]

Why on earth should we try and match up with unsuccessful clubs!?!

Maybe you missed the unbolded majority of my post.

The Highlanders play in Queenstown, NZ in the Super 15s, hence if we entered some sort of partnership with them, we could have access to their facilities in NZ, which would provide a great base for altitude training in our pre-season.

 

[Unnamed1]

Maybe you missed the unbolded majority of my post.

The Highlanders play in Queenstown, NZ in the Super 15s, hence if we entered some sort of partnership with them, we could have access to their facilities in NZ, which would provide a great base for altitude training in our pre-season.

and what would they get in return from us?

 

[Dogs_r_barking]

and what would they get in return from us?

We could host them when they play in Melbourne, encourage our fans to support them as a sister club.

 

[Gus]

Youtube channel is up

http://www.youtube.com/user/BulldogsTVOfficial