Posts Tagged ‘University of Washington’

Be Careful Student Sports Reporters, Your School May Have an In-Game Tweet Limit

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on November 13, 2012 | 4 Comments »

Journalists are currently abuzz about the University of Washington men’s basketball team– not for its play but for how it’s allowed to be covered.

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Athletics officials at the school recently told a local sports reporter to stop live-tweeting so much during an early season game.  The weird warning revealed a new official rule instituted for all live coverage of UW games by outside press– 20 tweets tops at basketball games and no more than 45 tweets during football games.

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Hmm.  The restriction, known formally as a “live coverage policy,” is apparently similar to those being enacted or considered by other sports programs at colleges and universities nationwide.  On spec, it seems to be an attempt to have more netizens check out the school’s own live online coverage.

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It is also undoubtedly a larger push to control as much of the in-the-moment media coverage of its teams as possible, in exchange for reporter access to the fun and games.  As former sports reporter Brian Moritz confirms, “Yes, every reporter who gets a press credential signs a release that includes the rules. No, none of them ever read it. Seriously, when’s the last time you read the terms and conditions when you update iTunes?”

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It is the latest sports reporting body blow at the college level brought to light this semester, including increasing limits on reporting on team practices and student-athlete injuries.  Heck, University of Kansas head football coach Charlie Weis does not believe the KU student newspaper should provide any negative coverage of his dismal gridiron squad at all.

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So, big question of the day: Does your school have a social media policy for live sports coverage?  And bigger question: What other limits, if any, do sports reporters at your news outlet face, especially when covering your school’s A-list players and teams?

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Officials Limit Student Press Reporting on College Football Practices, Player Injuries

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on October 4, 2012 | 1 Comment »

School and team officials are increasingly ordering the student and professional press to refrain from reporting on college football player injuries via observations made or information obtained during team practices.

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As a respected adviser at an A-list student newspaper shared yesterday on a popular college media list-serv, “My sports editor just told me that our football beat reporter was approached at practice by the team’s sports info guy and ‘informed’ that the [paper] was not to report on players’ injuries anymore.  As in, we see a guy walking around in a cast, we can’t report that. If we do, the football coach will freeze the paper out of mid-week availability.  Which is completely ludicrous, of course.”

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Ludicrous, but not unprecedented.  Daily Trojan editors at the University of Southern California noted in an editorial last week, “USC now prohibits the reporting of injuries observed during in-season practices– much like conference foes, such as Oregon, UCLA, and Washington, which have recently enacted similar policies.  The trend is one in which journalists are discouraged and even prevented, by the threat of banned access, from reporting on certain subjects.”

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The editors, understandably, are not fans of the increased restrictions.  The editorial’s close: “As a publication looking to report the objective truth, the Daily Trojan does not agree with the continued efforts of the USC athletic department and institutions around the nation to keep publicly relevant information behind closed doors.  Organizations should aim to level the playing field with transparency rather than keeping facts in the dark.”

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This factual darkening is, alas, becoming standard practice on many campuses.  A separate college media adviser notes, “This is a national trend right now.  We have dealt with it this year, as have many, many professional reporters. . . . This is trickle down, as the NFL has been asinine about this stuff for years despite league mandates on injury reports.  It’s typical coaches being paranoid and controlling. . . . Our policy right now is going along to get along, which leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but also gives us the option of picking our battles.”

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Bottom line: Can you truly keep an injured player from the press?  A college media adviser at a Division 1 school rightly explains, “The difference between a student journalist and a professional journalist, in this case, is that the student journalist may have class with an injured player or may see that player on crutches in the cafeteria.  The coach can hide a player from the professional media, but not always from the eyes of student sports writers.”

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Rupert Murdoch’s Daily Confused with University of Washington’s Daily

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on August 3, 2012 | 1 Comment »

The Daily, Rupert Murdoch’s tablet news operation, is dying– or at least dramatically downsizing and reevaluating its existence.  The Daily of the University of Washington is doing just fine– evolving step-by-step in the digital age.

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Don’t get them confused, OK?

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The two pubs sport similar Twitter handles.  The UW student newspaper boasts @thedaily.  The Daily has just @daily.  This has apparently led the Twitterati to repeatedly mistake one for the other– especially over the last few days as the masses eagerly share the breaking news that Murdoch’s Daily is laying off a third of its staff.

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In a blog post yesterday, Andrew Gospe, the UW Daily’s social media manager, shared a screenshot sampling of recent mistaken-identity tweets.  As he writes, “I see around three to five misdirected tweets per day to our account (4,650 followers) from people who are really looking for the other Daily that isn’t a college newspaper (more than 97,000 followers).  With the recent news about the layoffs, the mistweets really started heating up.”

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According to Gospe, if Murdoch’s Daily goes under, one unintentional consequence: “[T]hose who manage the UW Daily’s Twitter in the future won’t be privy to such amusing tweets.”

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Student Press Story Headlines That Make Me Giggle #7 (@thedaily @butlercollegian)

Posted in College Media, Journalism, Student Newspaper, tagged , , , , , on January 19, 2012 | Leave a Comment »

Texting and driving has made headlines in recent months.  Sleep texting has even leapt onto the scene lately as a particularly curious phenomenon.  But one other text-centric habit deserving of a spotlight has largely been ignored . . . until now.

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As the header to a recent commentary appearing in The Butler Collegian observes, “Texting and Walking Becomes a Nuisance.“

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In the spirited piece, Collegian graphics editor Erin Drennan writes, “We all know at least one person that can barely walk on a flat surface, let alone walk and chew gum at the same time without falling over, so why is it that so many people walk and text on their phone at the same time? . . . [S]tudents and faculty both should start being a little more aware of their surroundings while walking down the halls or while strutting through the crosswalks between buildings.”

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In close second is a headline topping a story in The Daily at the University of Washington that is bursting with smile-inducing idealism.  As the main header explains, “Why I Love Country Music And Don’t Care If You Don’t.“

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As the wonderfully lively piece by Olivia Zech begins, “I am the country anthem warbler.  My friends . . . have witnessed me mid-pirouette, spinning carefree to Lady Antebellum, Brad Paisley, Miranda Lambert, and even Miss Swift herself.  They apparently are incapable of knocking.  I am notorious for changing the radio station to 100.7 The Wolf.  I covet red cowboy boots. I caught a three-pound fish once and reeled it in with a sparing amount of man help.  I am the girl who hums hick tunes at unsuitable times.“

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