It's Good to be Right

Standing line from the 2005 and 2006 network media presentations -- participatory media is a force multiplier for the legacy media. Still don't believe? Try these quick one-offs just from around our neighborhood:

When the whole early announce for the bowls went horribly awry last week, the legacy media turned to whatever proof they could find that certain schools had become associated with certain bowls. One here at Arkansas was the intrepid work to discover a deleted link on the Liberty Bowl Facebook page to a bootleg Razorback video on YouTube -- j'accuse, evidence of the bid.

Another moment -- perhaps trying too hard -- our newspaper tried to infer that because of a keystroke error by a stat person that one of our suspended players was on the bench. A bit lame, one might say, but it was born of our strong on-line fan base noticing the entry of the player's name on ESPN.com's stat tracker -- not even ours.

And never overlook the ability of a well-placed Tweet to cause news. Our athletic director is very keen on the concept, and when he decided to let folks know he was having dinner with the ownership of a NBA franchise about a potential preseason game in Fayetteville, it created a buzz.

Not just here, but Cincinnati football coach Brian Kelley made his release to the world that he would listen to Notre Dame last week via his Twitter feed.

Just informed our team that Notre Dame has contacted me and I will listen to what they have to say

Side note: one of those covering Kelly's tweet was the Chicago Tribune, who has a Twitter, Inc., page that is filled with similar social media news breaks.

The 140 takeaway: Ignore and avoid the social media at your own peril, because your legacy media certainly is not.