Beats By Dre/YouTube screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET

Is the NFL tone deaf? Not at all. It merely hears the beat of money loudest.

Which is definitely not the Beats of money, currently.

Last weekend, I mentioned that NFL players wouldn't be allowed to wear their precious Beats (or any other competing brand) on game day when cameras are around. The NFL has a deal with Bose. Bose will be Bose.

Now, San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick has revealed that he was fined $10,000 for wearing his pink Beats to last Sunday's game.



Kaepernick was asked by CSN Bay Area 49ers insider Matt Maiocco whether he or Beats would pay the fine.

"We'll let that be unanswered," was his reply. I have contacted the NFL for confirmation and will update, should I hear.

Beats has already cried foul that the Bose exclusive would affect the very DNA of athletes.

I wonder whether, in wearing his pink Beats (pink presumably to support the NFL's breast cancer initiative), Kaepernick -- and Beats -- had in his DNA a calculated strategy.

What is a $10,000 fine when you can generate publicity for your brand, and attach it to the pure, slightly rebel element upon which it has been built?