Banning Twitter isn’t the answer for college sports

Posted: September 29th, 2009 | Author: | Filed under: Higher Ed, Social Media, Sports, Web 2.0 | Tags: , , , , | 4 Comments »

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4 Comments on “Banning Twitter isn’t the answer for college sports”

  1. 1 Eric Stoller said at 8:23 PM on September 29th, 2009:

    Being an academic advisor, I cringe at how these guys from TTU are being treated. The “student” in “student athlete” isn’t part of the equation. The players are almost like contracted employees who have less freedoms than full time staffers at the institution. I get that D1 Football is a business, and just like with Apple Inc., unapproved information releases can damage a carefully crafted PR machine. But we’re talking about students here…students who should be allowed to use tools that can help them in their future endeavors. If I were his players, I would have a big issue with regards to mandatory Facebook monitoring.

  2. 2 Ron Bronson said at 8:28 PM on September 29th, 2009:

    Sadly, they just take it as par for their course. If there was a bit of education, there would be less fearmongering and more intelligent approaches to how this gets handled. The athletes probably just expect it as part of the game and don’t raise too much opposition because they’re competing in major conference activities and so forth. I think where it’d be interesting is to see how athletes away from the bright lights react to these intrusions and how they deal with it, as I suspect I know how.

  3. 3 Tracy Mueller said at 9:16 AM on October 6th, 2009:

    Couldn’t agree more. Now, as both a UT alum and staff member, I may be a bit biased, but I think Mack Brown’s approach is right on target. He just told players not to post anything you wouldn’t want mom to see.

    Social media can be a very powerful tool for connecting people and rallying a fan base, and those who ban it outright are sticking their head in the sand and missing out on a huge opportunity. Players get media training, right? You know reporters are going to ask them questions, and they’re going to be in the news, so they need to be prepared to handle themselves appropriately and be a trusted brand extenstion of the program and the school. The same mentality should exist for social media.

  4. 4 Ron Bronson said at 9:17 AM on October 6th, 2009:

    I agree with you, that Mack Brown’s approach is better than any of the other coaches. Because he realized that after football, there was little they could do about it. I

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