Sports and Social Media: Where Opportunity and Fear Collide

"There has been no shortage of stories on athletes using Twitter (Twitter) and social media to further their personal agendas.

On the flip side, we’ve also seen the organizations behind the professional sports leagues, and the media outlets covering them, struggle between their desire to understand and embrace social media and their fear of losing control of their entertainment properties.

Athletes and their representatives, coaches, staff members, and media analysts all pose a threat to the status quo. Cincinnati Bengals Wide Receiver Chad Ochocinco’s in-game tweets could mean that fans follow him over watching the television interview, Andy Roddick’s tennis tweets could reveal insider information, the ESPN analysts’ tweets on sports stories could attract off-camera discussion; the bottom line is that control of the message is slipping away with Twitter as a medium. It’s this fear of losing control that is driving organizations to restrict what gets said in a social media space."

Sports and Social Media: Where Opportunity and Fear Collide