Sportpost.com, the social network for sports fans whose launch we covered back in March, has unveiled a new version of the site today that specifically adds its own Facebook-style ‘Like’ button.
The ‘Post Up’ button, which can also be compared to Digg, lets users vote up the best content posted on the site, consisting of both user generated and submitted content, along with content from branded channels (see below). But interestingly and more ambitiously, the ‘Post Up’ button is now available to website owners and bloggers who want to encourage their readers to submit their content to Sportpost.
The pitch here is obvious: push your content to us and if it proves popular we’ll send you lots of traffic back. The caveat of course is that Sportpost employs an iFrame for external links, ensuring that the Sportpost brand is ever-present, which some sites won’t be happy about. In its defense, Sportpost says that it’s just acting like other social booking and sharing sites and that the frame, which can be dismissed by the user, is there to enable users to easily comment and interact with the content on Sportpost, not for direct monetization purposes i.e. the frame is ad-free.
UK-based Sportpost is founded by three Loughborough University alumni, all with a sports industry background, and mixes up user-generated and submitted content from users, and branded channels from sports stars and brands. That latter places a big emphasis on video: The site now boasts over 140 premium sports video channels. Channel partners now include the Ferrari and McLaren F1, Puma, Red Bull, the NBA, ATP Tennis Tour, The PGA Tour, London 2012, FC Barcelona and England Rugby.
Sportpost is backed by angels and private investors, including the chef Raymond Blancto, to the tune of $600,000.