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FWIW, it's not clear to me, based on the By-laws, that something like a "First interception of the season pool," funded solely by players, would be a violation of the rules. As near as I can tell, the Saints are in hot water for four reasons:
(1) At least one coach (Williams) was involved in administering the bounties.
(2) Outsiders apparently pledged/actually contributed money, creating salary cap violations.
(3) The program awarded money for injuring players (a specific violation of the memo sent to all players and teams).
(4) People with responsibility lied to Goodell.
Thought experiment: Let's assume that instead of what actually happened, the story that broke was that in 2009, the entire Saints defense had been pooling money to award $1,000 for each TO that season. No coaches or outsiders were involved, and no money awarded for injuries. I think the players might have been fined $5,000-$10,000 each, and that would have been the last we'd hear of it.
Based on the By-laws videotaping from the sidelines wasn't a violation. The NFL has many rules in many forms and not all of them are publicly accessible. Experiment, try and find the complete rules or a formula governing compensation picks...
If it's not a violation of the rules, why would they get fined for it? Everyone acknowledges that they know pay for play under any circumstances it's against the rules. They also know it's almost impossible to police, kind of like run of the mill, day to day, tampering. Every once in a while something fairly blatent surfaces and/or someone complains and an investigation insues and occasionally a penalty is imposed. But agents talking to GM's every day engage in tampering violations per the rules and that stuff just never gets looked into because there aren't enough hours in the day...