If Twitter was a sport and short snooker

I've been trying to imagine that if Twitter was a sport, what sport would it be? I figured it would have to take place in short bursts. It would also have to be direct and have the qualities required of all good sports. That is being really interesting and engaging or crushingly boring and mundane at any moment.  One essential component would have to be that it must be completely impenetrable to newcomers. 

To that end I've decided that if Twitter was a sport it would be Fencing. Each point is almost always brief. It has its own variety of excitement, other times its humdrum. But it is almost always it's baffling to watch for the first time. It also has a range of expressions and conventions which take time to learn and can result in the occasional faux par for the uninitiated. Fencing is a sport that demands that you conduct yourself properly and observe the proper etiquette. It helps if you have good poise as well.

I've had one fencing lesson myself and had a great time. I've always fancied giving it another go but it's a bit pricey for people like me who are most likely to give up after a couple of weeks.

I had a look on Twitter to see if their were any prominent Fencing tweeters and found none. They're missing a trick methinks and if any fencers stumble across this blog, can I suggest they consider micro blogging their matches (if that's the right term)? I'll give you a hand if you like...

The good people of Sports Business have reported the following disturbing development in the World of Snooker ahead of the world championships which starts tomorrow.

SNOOKER’S GOVERNING BODY announced it will launch a new short form of the game, provisionally called ‘Super6s’, in a bid to shake-up and modernise the sport. The ‘Super6s’ format will have six-minute matches, and will reduce the number of red balls from 15 to 6 to speed up play. Sir Rodney Walker, the chairman of World Snooker, said, “As an observer of snooker you cannot churn out the same diet year after year. Look at what Twenty20 has done for cricket. It brought in a whole new audience so what we have in mind we think would be appealing to a younger audience.”

Not being young, I've taken something of a dislike to Twenty20 cricket. I don't think that this is because my attention span has increased since I've got older, I suspect it's because I think that the players look stupid in pyjamas and have that the short version of the game has appalling taste in music. I also think that a good number of Twenty20 matches end in a whimper just as much as a one day match or a test match.

Personally, I think that there is a place for long drawn out sporting events and am not convinced that young people don't like cricket and snooker because they are long. Golf is a sport which goes on forever, but you don't hear the PGA announcing a new Pitch & Putt3Hole competition designed to appeal to those valuable 18-25s who are so dynamic that they haven't even got time for a space bar, they're just too damn busy.

No, I suspect that the problems that Snooker and Cricket have is that people either believe it is a crap sport or they know it is a crap sport. Having said that, if by producing a shortened version for the benefit of a new audience, they can attract people to their sport then I guess it's not a bad idea. However, I'm not convinced that by making your beloved sport shorter, you're sending the right message. It's like saying "Snooker6s: It's good because it doesn't drag on as much as usual."

Besides, who says proper snooker can't be played quickly?

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The Onion Bag and @onionbag. Where next?

My latest hair-brained scheme is the 140er. It’s like the Fiver only not as good, long or funny. The 140er is a round up of the of the day's football news in 140 characters.

Hopefully over time it will become a sharp witted, pithy and above all brief news round-up that will become a part of football loving Twitterers daily routine.

I'm going to use @onionbag because it fits and because I'm aware that the majority of @redduffman followers aren't into football. However I am a little worried about the whole @onionbag thing. Should I be twittering as me or as the Onion Bag?

I think a lot of people on Twitter think that official website Twitters are not done. They’re either too commercial or they don’t follow back or they’re generally using Twitter to plug their website. I’d like to think that the Onion Bag is not really into that sort of thing. Its not like the Bag is a commercial organisation. We don't even run ads on the home page, only the archive.

Having said that, since I started the Bag's Twitter stream I've not been entirely certain as to what to do with it. Do I simply use it as another feed like RSS or should I try to write Onion Bag content as tweets (or tweets as very small Bags)?

I guess the answer should be yes to both .So that's why I think its OK to start the 140er on the Onion Bag's Twitter stream. Its time I saw @onionbag as an extension of The Onion Bag website itself.

Rock on.

Further reading: Do Brands Belong On Twitter?

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Live football commentary on Twitter: A call to arms

At the beginning of the football season I set up a Twitter account called Pressffive. The idea was to bring live text updates (live blogging if you like) into the Twitterverse.

For those who do not know, there are any number of live match commentaries by sports website designed to describe the action unfolding at a football match. Anyone stuck at work or otherwise unable to watch a game can follow the action minute-by-minute. Basically someone watches the game and types up whats going on into a CMS which is posted on to dynamically updating or static web page. Leading exponents of this are The Guardian (clever and funny) and the BBC (efficient). It also works brilliantly for Cricket.

To be frank you don't need to be a hot-shot social networking guru to work out that this sort of service would be ideal on Twitter. In fact it would work better as the commentary just becomes part of your Twitter stream rather than having to stare at a browser waiting for it to update. So if you are at work, you could actually get some work done. Or if you didn't fancy that then you can get involved with the commentary yourself in the way that Twitter allows you to do. I've said it before and I'll say it again. Twitter allows you to share a common experience as though you were all sat on a sofa watching the game together. What's more at 140 characters its cuts down on the bullshit.

Anyway so I gave it a try and it was reasonably well received. The first game was a Champions League qualifier featuring Liverpool. It was difficult at first to describe what was going on and keep things pithy and interesting but I thought it worked really well. I even got a request to do a Premier League game later than month. Unfortunately, that's where I ran into trouble.

I'm not wireless. I don't got no laptop and my desk top is upstairs while my Cable box is downstairs. Now I realise that there are ways of watching football on the 'Net through various unlicensed means but whenever I've tried that the quality is appalling. I tried working with live streaming with some Serie A games on Bet 365 but it was crap (and I didn't get much of a response).

That's not my only problem. I work late shifts and one week in two I'm still on my way home from work during mid week games. So even if and when I do go wireless, I still won't be able to provide the regular service that this sort of thing really needs in order for it to catch on. @chrisoakley and I discussed doing something similar for @SPAOTP on 3rd round day however a regular service looks unlikely for the foreseeable.

However, that shouldn't stop anyone else from giving it a go. Let's face it, sooner or later one of the mainstream media will get hold of the idea which, if it falls into the wrong hands, could be really dry and stultified. Something like this needs to start in the Twitterverse by the Twitterverse, not by some noob corporate type who thinks it will be a great idea to intersperse every third tweet with an advert.

There aren't too many football bloggers on Twitter that I can find and there isn't much of a football constituency either. There soon will be though so for any early adopters reading this, maaaaybe they should give it some thought. Perhaps in some sort of joint venture. I'd be the first to follow. Of course, if I can help out at at any time...?

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#Mumbai and the news from Twitter

I don’t have a problem with Twitter being used as a new source. After all it’s simply another form of communication like TV, Internet, phone, two cups strung together etc . The value or worth of what it produces is entirely down to the person yelling into the cup.

I'm frequently #Mumbai on Twitter. The full extent and scale of the horror is yet to be fully realised. However, it has provided an example of social networking works in such a situation. There is a mixture of eye witness accounts, outbursts of disbelief, political commentary, outlandish claims and general pontification. All live and unmediated.

The downside was the inevitable rise of unsubstantiated rumour and counter-rumour that has surfaced. This is hardly surprising and perfectly understandable. However it does represent a set back to those who advocate Twitter as a legitimate news gathering source.

I'm not necessarily arguing that Twitter can't reliably break news. However, it is difficult to establish if some Tweets are

a. First hand information

b. Not originally sourced from a third party which could be found out through another means (like watching it on the telly).

c. Complete bollocks

So from a news gathering or news breaking point of view, Twitter is no better or worse than any other form of communication in that it depends entirely how trustworthy the source is.

On the other hand, when it comes to news coverage, Twitter has huge potential.

The enormous reach and portability of Twitter means that anyone with a basic mobile phone can relay information from anywhere within range of a cell mast. This means that any sort of event can be shared with people from all over the world. Within the context of news it could be an unconference, a demonstration, a natural disaster or a war zone.

What makes news coverage via Twitter so effective is the myriad audio and video applications it supports like 12seconds, Seesmic, Phreadz and QIK to name but a few. It’s this element of citizen journalism that some professional hacks may not like because they’ve become so used to using news wires to break stories that all they have to give them an edge over the rest of us is the quality of the coverage. Others recognise its potential and get involved.

Twitter empowers citizen journalists and allows them to not only report on on the spot but more importantly, enables them to reach a huge audience. Its not a complete solution as it lacks the objectivity in the same way embedded journalism does. However, it doesn't go through the usual news media prism and is received without being framed to suit anyone else's agenda. That, for me is its true value.

As post script I'd like to mention the emerging notion that Twitter is or was being used by terrorists with phones in Mumbai to monitor #mumbai for locations of potential targets.

The idea of terrorists sifting through thousands of tweets from people all over the world expressing concern, relating CNN feeds and cracking the odd bad joke on a mobile while hiding from the Indian security forces in the faint hope that there is still a politician or high ranking soldier foolish enough to still be out in the open is frankly laughable. At least it would be if you removed the appalling backdrop. I for one am not having a bar of that and would question the motives behind anyone propagating the idea.

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