The United States Golf Association, as many avid golfers know, is one of the official governing bodies of golf globally. The organization does many good things for the game, including hosting tournaments, testing equipment, providing grants, and encouraging etiquette and fair play by writing and maintaining the Rules of Golf.
The USGA, founded in 1894, also celebrates the history of the game and is bound by tradition. This is a blue-blazer-and-bowtie crowd. Think saddle shoes. Like totally old school. For real.
The organization has taken a hardline stance against certain technological innovations to theoretically protect the heritage and retain the inherent challenge of the game. Great, if you’re into that sort of thing.
But then the USGA did something seemingly out of character. They embraced technology in recent years, particularly innovations in communications, the Internet and digital media. They improved their web site, posting new videos online. They revised their conservative logo, making it sleeker. They even allowed the use of laser range finders and GPS-based distance measuring devices. Impressive.
Last year I was prepared to applaud the organization for these exciting changes and the somewhat surprising introduction of an iPhone application for the U.S. Open, the USGA’s grandest tournament. The app offered a live leaderboard, real-time statistics and streaming footage of the golf broadcast coverage. Way to go, guys! (And, I do mean guys, if you know what I mean.)
Digitizing the rules of golf
Then, recently the USGA released an iPhone app for the Rules of Golf, a complex book of regulations about how to play the game and keep score. On one hand the new app – available for iPhone, iPod Touch and coming soon to BlackBerry and Android devices – is a great opportunity to reach a younger demographic, something golf sorely needs. The app should be heralded as a breakthrough for a stodgy, conservative organization reinventing itself as technology leader. Only the USGA blew it.
Now, the new app is an example of the USGA ambitiously trying but not quite understanding what the next generation wants in terms of digital experiences. A for effort, F for execution.
For one, the USGA failed to capitalize on the capabilities of the medium. Like newspapers in the 1990s, the USGA just dumped the text of the Rules of Golf book in a digital format. It’s a book, only it’s electronic. Where are the colorful icons and interactive features? Instead you have a black-and-white table of contents. What about animations, graphics or videos explaining the various interpretations of the rules? Egregiously absent.
The app is searchable and does have a jump dial for scrolling quickly to a specific rule, only they are categorized by number. Rule 1, 2, 3. Show me some common scenarios instead. Few average weekend golfers, who hardly follow the rules as it is, know that Rule 26-1(c) addresses options for gaining relief for a ball in a water hazard. Nerd alert!
$4? I’ll just buy a latte, thanks
Finally, the USGA’s biggest miss of all is the $3.99 price tag. Many apps are free, and most consumers balk at apps costing more than 99 cents – the standard price for most apps. The USGA would likely argue that $4 is a relative value for the Rules of Golf, the Decisions on the Rules of Golf and the Rules of Amateur Status, publications that combined would cost consumers about $25 if printed and shipped.
However, the USGA Rules of Golf app should be free. Period.
If the organization truly wants to grow the game and encourage everyone to play by a common set of rules, it should want to make understanding the rules as easy and accessible as possible. Of course there are software development costs, and the USGA is on a budget. These are lean economic times and it is tempting to try to generate revenue from the new rules app. But it’s the wrong thing to do.
In an effort to monetize the Rules of Golf app the USGA could have taken the same strategic approach many other companies have attempted. Offer a free Rules of Golf Lite version with limited functionality, and a $4 premium version with clear visuals, easy-to-access icons and animations showing how to properly play by the rules.
Try, try again
Look, I appreciate the USGA. No, really. I’m currently a member with a bag tag and everything. But, at least in this case, the USGA needs some unsolicited input about its digital media efforts.
Keep embracing new technologies, USGA. Your willingness to evolve is good. But, don’t try to keep people out. That’s what’s wrong with golf. Let them in and make it affordable. It’s only $4, but it’s significantly more than most apps, you’re sending the wrong message and there are larger goals at stake.
You must change the old thinking that has made golf an exclusive, elitist sport that turns off the masses. Don’t take the same protectionist mindset – a viewpoint that you can just keep clinging to your traditional targets without courting a new, broader audience – that has befallen the major metro newspapers, what’s left of them. Find another way to subsidize your $4 app (some modest advertisements?) and do the right thing on the web by encouraging golfers to learn and use the rules for free. This was an opportunity to change perceptions.
Short-sighted vision shows up in the golf industry in large and small ways every day. The industry, like the USGA, is trying to be more open and embracing for the future, only it continues to act in outdated ways that fail to encourage growth – and, now there’s an app for that.
Corey, you make some really good points here. It is strange that the app is $4. I think they would get many more downloads if it was .99-and maybe even make the same amount of money? I have to admit that I did not buy it, but I was not really aware that it was available. I think I will buy it.
The USGA kind of reminds me of the older, kind of geeky dad who wants to be cool and fit in with his son’s friends, but just doesn’t.
I don’t own an iPhone but I was wondering what the USGA’s rule is on time allocated per hole for the purchase of alcoholic beverages. Depending on the attractiveness of the “supplier” this can take up to 5 min. Please enlighten me so I can adhere to the rules.
Really ? $4 for an app – but $2 for the printed book ? Must have something to do with Apple.
I guess it’s the “modern” mentality that doesn’t appreciate the traditions of the game as much as they used to – permitting the Jim Rome philosophy of “if you ain’t cheatin’ – you ain’t tryin’” inside the ropes. The idea that breaking the rules ends the game doesn’t fit in this era.
Technology can be fun and great, but if it overshadows the game, then the game isn’t what it’s supposed to be. The US Court system should have told Ping that they have no jurisdiction in private businesses like this – but they didn’t – and the USGA was handcuffed from that point on. New clubs every couple of months became the name of the game – buy yourself a new game with new technology…which only meant hitting the ball further into the woods for most of us.
Sixteen years too late, the USGA is trying to clamp down on a little bit of the technology by cuttind down on the ability to stop the ball or even spin it back from the rough. The rough is SUPPOSED to be penalizing, not just somehing that keeps you from seeing what kind of shoes the players are wearing.
The rule really only affects professionals and the best amateurs since the USGA decided that the rest of us don’t “have” to switch until 2024, but manufacturers can only sell the old grooves through this year.
It’s confusing and probably not being carried out in the best possible way, but it’s an attempt to bring the fairway back into the game. Accuracy is supposed to mean something in golf.
33 – When I searched on the USGA app for your request all I got was – “File not found”.
I’d say defer to your own (questionable) judgment and playing partners willingness to tolerate your drunken lusty pursuits.
I carry one of these around, and it looks like they have an iPhone app now as well… however, the site featuring the app is frying my IE, so i don’t know how much it costs.
http://www.golfrulesmadeeasy.com/index.asp
I like the pictures and situation-based reference.
As the Golf Chick told me, “There’s a nap for that”
SLW and Corey,
Talk about over priced, Golf Rules Made Easy app is a $10 app that did not work for me. (how do I get my money back?) Though it does have nice cartoons and illustrations for you Corey. I think the USGA was spot on in there design of the app. When I’m playing who needs fluff. I just purchased it and it seems real easy to navigate from contents all the way to a Decision. My favorite feature was the linking when a rule or definition is referenced. Thanks for telling us about a nice app Corey.
I’d blame it all on Apple and aggressive revenue sharing demands from the folks in Cupertino.
I think some of the people missed the part about the app has the rules of golf book ($2 printed) AND Decisions on the Rules of Golf ($16 printed).
For those that don’t know Decisions on the Rules of Golf is a second much larger book that explains the way the USGA interprets the rules that are in the little $2 book.