Major League Baseball bans MLB.com writers from using Twitter for non-baseball topics
Apr 27, 2010, 9:25 PM EDT
Multiple sources have confirmed to me that Major League Baseball is cracking down on Twitter usage, ordering MLB.com writers to cease tweeting about all non-baseball topics and scolding players for their Twitter usage in general.
As someone who has every MLB.com beat writer and several MLB players in my Twitter feed, this is very unfortunate and strikes me as a massive overreaction. Allowing the writers and players to show a bit of personality and interact with fans/readers was a positive thing and certainly caused me to become a fan of those who did it well.
Certainly setting standards for the type of content MLB employees post on Twitter is reasonable, but simply banning all non-baseball talk for MLB.com writers and preemptively scolding players who’ve done nothing wrong is … well, it’s just a real shame.
I’m told a big part of the policy change is due to MLB not wanting non-baseball tweets showing up on the MLB.com Twitter feed/aggregator, but banning every writer from non-baseball talk because of that is like killing a fly with a sledgehammer.
UPDATE: MLB denies Twitter crackdown, but facts say otherwise
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- Mike Rogers - Apr 27, 2010 at 9:26 PM
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This most assuredly is a result of Brad Ziegler talking about the Immigration Law in Arizona and the A’s moving/not moving.
http://twitter.com/bradziegler
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- ThatGuy - Apr 27, 2010 at 9:27 PM
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I wonder if they allow them to have personal accounts outside of work, ie your aarongleeman.com blog while you work for NBCsports
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- Old Gator - Apr 27, 2010 at 9:34 PM
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This is nothing. Expect to see Twitter on MLB’s list of banned substances in the near future. And good riddance to it. Except that it doesn’t promise you nights of paradise, it’s just another form of spam anyway.
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Personally, the whole idea of a “Twitter Feed” repels me. All it does is attract more twitterers to the yard, and I have more than enough trouble already keeping my car clean between the squirrels, monk parakeets and iguanas.
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Aside from that, I find obsession with the 140-character limit a digital form of anality. I mean, it’s not even a mystical number among Armenian gypsies. If you’re going to be arbitrary, why not force people who are addicted to this ridiculous system to get really creative and make them compose their text bytes in haiku?
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- Bote Man - Apr 27, 2010 at 9:56 PM
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Yawn.
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- Ayaz Hyder - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:02 PM
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MLB continues to be stuck in the middle ages. Completely ridiculous. Although I shouldn’t expect any different since their social media department is an absolute joke. They blocked me on twitter because I wrote a blog post and sent it to them. The topic of that blog post? It was an entry about MLB’s online store advertising Yankees World Series merchandise DURING Game 6 of ALCS.
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- Wake - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:09 PM
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Old Gator, the reason for the limit is that it’s the most amount of characters that can be displayed in a standard cell phone text message. It’s not arbitrary.
Second, if you don’t like it, don’t use it. Most twitter writers and professionals use it as a quick linking service for similar topics, or immediate reaction to events in game that don’t require complicated blog posts. “Mike Lowell just pinch hit for David Ortiz with the bases loaded” doesn’t need anything more than that, but it’s certainly information worth sharing. “Check out this story on Team X Prospect Y’s development” also nice for sharing with the fans.
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- Jonathan Polk - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:13 PM
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I would like to see someone kill a fly with a sledgehammer,
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- Dave - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:23 PM
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I can see MLB banning players from using Twitter during games but what about outside of games??? Doesn’t MLB have their own twitter account?
Twitter.com/MLB
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- Tucker - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:30 PM
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The 140-character limit isn’t arbitrary. It has to do with the number of characters available in the majority of SMS messages.
And this is a bit overkill on MLB’s part in trying to find a balance.
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- Largebill - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:35 PM
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I doubt it has to do with Brad Ziegler. Though you never know.
My guess is they saw the level of crazy displayed by Peter Gammons when discussing anything not involving baseball. I used to think he was fairly bright and insightful. Now that I’ve seen him babble on politics . . . not so much. He’s to the left of Castro and makes Olbermann seem intelligent.
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- thatGuy - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:35 PM
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SMS messages are 160 characters so that logic doesn’t seem to work.
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- Zach - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:47 PM
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They could probably change their aggregator to only pull tweets that have special hash tags on it.
That way the writers could talk about whatever but only tag the ones they want to show up. It’s really not that hard (I know NJ.com does it for their baseball writers), and a much better solution than what they are doing currently.
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- Um, actually... - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:49 PM
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…it’s a lot more likely a response to former mediocre MLBer Mike Bacsik’s far more offensive drunken tweets. Disclaimer: it’s actually offensive, so don’t be upset if you click it and get offended. http://i.tsn.com/i/photos/20100426/141681.jpg
I know he’s not currently MLB associated, but the lesson probably spreads across all of sports media.
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- Sam O - Apr 27, 2010 at 10:50 PM
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Oh, whatever. I follow these guys for one reason. Baseball.
Just like I don’t care about what Alan Sepinwall has to say about the Yankees, I don’t care what Ian Browne is listening to in his iPod. Or Matthew Leach’s opinion on the NBA playoffs.
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- Colonel Kernel - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:04 PM
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Easy for me to say this as MLB.com isn’t my employer, but they can go take a flying leap.
They have no right to tell anyone, writer in their employ or not, what they can and can not do on their own personal Twitter account. If they don’t like what the person tweets, they can UNFOLLOW THEM.
If MLB.com wants them to use twitter, then they can set up a separate account for them to tweet from, like: mlb_jsmith. Or the writer can created an account incognito.
This comes down to freedom of speech and personal decisions. If MLB.com can dictate this they can also bar them from certain restaurants or businesses.
On those Twitter accounts they have to conduct themselves properly, not disparaging their employer and such, but beyond that, MLB.com has no say.
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- will - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:11 PM
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then do not follow sam!! MLB is really screwed up. Is Goodell the commish of MLB now?
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- Colonel Kernel - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:16 PM
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@Old Gator @ThatGuy
Twitter’s 140-character limit is BASED on the SMS limit of 160 characters. I wasn’t using Twitter at the beginning, but SMS was the only mobile method of posting then. This is a guess, but the remaining 20 characters might have been used for Twitter specific commands.
And for anyone debating the usefulness of Twitter, take a wild, unrestrained guess how I learned of this article.
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- joeiscool12 - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:18 PM
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they should just have them add an #mlb hash tag or something for the feed aggregator. but that would make too much sense.
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- Colonel Kernel - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:22 PM
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@Old Gator @ThatGuy
Twitter’s 140-character limit is BASED on the SMS limit of 160 characters. I wasn’t using Twitter at the beginning, but SMS was the only mobile method of posting then. This is a guess, but the remaining 20 characters might have been used for Twitter specific commands.
And for anyone debating the usefulness of Twitter, take a wild, unrestrained guess how I learned of this article.
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- Reader - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:29 PM
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Some reporting. If you subscribe to all the beat writers’ feeds, then you know that some are already starting separate accounts for their personal tweets.
If you care what kind of coffee your beat writer drinks or what music is in his iPod, by all means, subscribe to his personal account. I for one am glad I will no longer have to sort through the drivel to get baseball news.
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- Reader - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:31 PM
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Some reporting. If you subscribe to all the beat writers’ feeds, then you know that some are already starting separate accounts for their personal tweets.
If you care what kind of coffee your beat writer drinks or what music is in his iPod, by all means, subscribe to his personal account. I for one am glad I will no longer have to sort through the drivel to get baseball news.
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- Kenny from Pikesville - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:32 PM
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What’s wrong with Roger Goodell? I think he’s a hell of a commish. Nothing wrong with strong oversight of professional sports. Perhaps had the owners not run a real commissioner out of baseball, the entire steroids era would not have been overlooked.
Baseball writers should stick to talking baseball on their Twitter accounts.
Happens to be I think it’s ridiculous MLB has to mandate that.
KFP
“The Curse of Davey Johnson”
http://oriolesshallreturn.blogspot.com
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- Brian - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:47 PM
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The reason MLB is doing this is to try to enforce antiquated rules on emerging media markets. They want their partners in revenue to be the only source of information, and damn if any MLB player dare show any personality.
Instead of letting MLB players embrace twitter as a way to personally connect to their fans, and continue to drive up attendance, Bud ‘Steroid’ Selig has his fingers in his ears and imposes this idiotic rule.
If anyone for a minute thinks this is about anything but MONEY then you are naive. Twitter (and all social media sites) are a way for players to directly interact with their fans, without having to worry about some writer, or media outlet (hello, ESPN) twisting their words or taking quotes out of context. If the players were allowed to have this interaction, the need for the ESPNs, the FOXs, etc. for information would be greatly diminished, and MLB doesn’t want that ad revenue going down.
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- Tom Sloan - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:49 PM
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Exactly!
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- Bud Selig - Apr 27, 2010 at 11:54 PM
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Dear Mr. Gleeman,
You request for credentials has been permanently denied.
Sincerely,
Bud Selig
