After several news agencies announced the suspension of coverage of the World Cup, it was hard to imagine that the IRB would hold out for long, faced with pressure from sponsors.

“What must surely be the ultimate nightmare for flacks is to host an event and the press doesn’t show up. So it went for Visa, it has five former rugby stars on the payroll who are basically ambassadors for the credit card company and so it was a natural to hold a news conference for media interviews. No doubt Visa would show up in many of the picture backdrops. But most of the press didn’t show up. Disaster,” comments Follow the Media’s Philip Stone.

So the IRB reached a new compromise with news agencies and the first game of the World Cup got its much-needed media coverage. Agencies are able to transmit 200 photographs during each World Cup game, at a rate of one every 30 seconds, which was the main point of dissension up till Friday. Members of the media coalition rejoiced over the agreement, while reminding that they must meet today to negotiate rights on video-like coverage.

But "there still remains one issue to be resolved and which will be discussed by the New Media Coalition and the IRB in Paris on Monday. The IRB has undertaken to seek a resolution to this issue concerning media organisations' use of audio-visual content. Reuters and the Coalition remain united in their pursuit of a satisfactory conclusion to this matter,” said Monique Villa, Reuters Global Head of News and Pictures.

"Were glad to be getting back to doing our jobs. Its not a completely done deal until the video details are ironed out Monday," said Dave Tomlin, the AP's associate general counsel for news.

Source: European Journalism Centre – Follow the Media