FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S • Hacker News Board

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#101

Post by akfanta » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:34 PM UTC

cbr wrote: post #98

akfanta wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get the point, those are hardly the only countries watch world cup. For a event like world cup final, it's the single most important match in 4 years. It won't just attract fans from the countries that are in the final. For example, the 2006 world cup attracted 4 billion viewers from China, and their team was not even playing.[1] [1] http://www.fifa.com/mm/document/fifafacts/ffprojects/ip-401_...

> 4 billion viewers from China Something suspicious about that...

How so? When you count viewership, of course they will combine number of viewers from each match, considering most of the viewers will tune in for just a few matches. This is common sense, I don't think there is anything suspicious about that.

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#102

Post by century19 » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:34 PM UTC

rodgerd wrote: post #28

iaw wrote: post #2

Wow. I'm impressed and somewhat surprised that the U.S. would be the entity to enforce this given the relative lack of presence FIFA has in the U.S. Maybe it's because the U.S. lost the world cup (as in hosting privileges)?

> I'm impressed and somewhat surprised that the U.S. would be the entity to enforce this given the relative lack of presence FIFA has in the U.S. The cudgel FIFA uses to prevent anyone looking too closely at how it does business is to threaten any member country with suspension from international competition if there is "political interference in football."

Indeed. Perhaps the US were the only country that could do this? Great that they did !

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#103

Post by mason240 » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:37 PM UTC

tomjen3 wrote: post #97

austenallred wrote: post #22

It seems like the DOJ is doing the same thing they would do against a gang; get a few lower-level people to take a plea deal and hand over the kingpin. There's no way Blatter gets through this unscathed. It will be interesting to see if the World Cup will be moved now; it never made sense to have it in Qatar in the first place (no infrastructure, incredibly hot during the summer, hundreds of migrant workers dying and…

What I don't get what does the DOJ have to do with FIFA? As far as I know it is an international group and Qatar is not a US state.

They used US banks for the bribery transactions.

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#104

Post by century19 » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:39 PM UTC

tragomaskhalos wrote: post #29

Not in time to prevent the nonsense of the Qatar world cup (nor to save the lives of the migrant workers being sacrificed to consummate that nonsense)

Why not in time? Mexico '86 was supposed to be in Columbia but was moved a couple of years before. Qatar isn't until 2022.

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#105

Post by iaskwhy » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:39 PM UTC

xasos wrote: post #94

iwwr wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently, hosting a World Cup has become a net negative to a country. The costs (significant and increasing) go to the government and the profits go to FIFA and the sponsors.

Yep, its really sad. It also applies for events like the Olympics, where infrastructure improvements are mandatory, and costs far outweigh any profit they may receive.

Which is why I support all these competitions to follow Euro 2020's idea: 13 cities in 13 countries. This one, the costs per nation are much lower and we stop seeing nations building new huge stadiums which are then completely empty and unused most of the time (like some of those built in Portugal in 2004).

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#106

Post by mason240 » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:39 PM UTC

austenallred wrote: post #49

hcho wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lack of infrastructure is not the crazy bit. Everyone knows that they have the money to throw at the problem. The fact that all games of WC will be played in one city is the problem. All the fans in contact for a prolonged span...It won't end well.

> Everyone knows that they have the money to throw at the problem. They may have money to throw at the problem, but Nepalese migrants building the infrastructure to host the 2022 World Cup died at a rate of almost one per day. Look at the full report, it's astounding: * Evidence of forced labour on a huge World Cup infrastructure project. * Some Nepalese men have alleged that they have not been paid for months and ha…

It's been estimated that a worker will die for every minute of game time across the tournament. Every minute of play = one dead worker.

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#107

Post by protomyth » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:39 PM UTC

tomjen3 wrote: post #97

austenallred wrote: post #22

It seems like the DOJ is doing the same thing they would do against a gang; get a few lower-level people to take a plea deal and hand over the kingpin. There's no way Blatter gets through this unscathed. It will be interesting to see if the World Cup will be moved now; it never made sense to have it in Qatar in the first place (no infrastructure, incredibly hot during the summer, hundreds of migrant workers dying and…

What I don't get what does the DOJ have to do with FIFA? As far as I know it is an international group and Qatar is not a US state.

I'm in the same boat. I get prosecuting the US citizens who paid bribes (long history there), but I don't get how the US can go after foreign nationals not on US soil for something that was done outside the US and not an attack on the US. I really don't understand why a country would extradite them in the first place.

We can get FIFA, but we cannot get Roman Polanski?

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#108

Post by freehunter » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:45 PM UTC

gadders wrote: post #99

freehunter wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right after we fix the NFL and MLB.

Are they that bad? I'm in the UK but I always thought they were fairly legit, if not very competent.

It was kind of tongue in cheek. The NFL and MLB are no where near as bad as FIFA or the IOC, although they affect me more since they're sports I watch, and they're also a little more in our court since they're actually American organizations. In terms of overall human rights and corruption, FIFA and IOC rate much higher. The only people really hurt by the actions of the NFL are the players.

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#109

Post by CSMastermind » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:45 PM UTC

gadders wrote: post #99

freehunter wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right after we fix the NFL and MLB.

Are they that bad? I'm in the UK but I always thought they were fairly legit, if not very competent.

Your sense is correct. They're nothing like the IOC or FIFA. It's more incompetence than corruption.

Re: FIFA Officials Arrested on Corruption Charges; Face Extradition to U.S

#110

Post by Ntrails » Wed, May 27, 2015, 2:45 PM UTC

xasos wrote: post #94

iwwr wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently, hosting a World Cup has become a net negative to a country. The costs (significant and increasing) go to the government and the profits go to FIFA and the sponsors.

Yep, its really sad. It also applies for events like the Olympics, where infrastructure improvements are mandatory, and costs far outweigh any profit they may receive.

Counterpoint - the infrastructure stays around. The stadiums get used and re-used, transport improvements benefit locals in perpetuity, tourism/trade brings in money to the economy, not to mention there are general "morale" reasons to host.

These are not profit making events to host, or at least they ought not to be. The benefits are varied and certainly not trivially reducible to profit/loss on the event itself.