The last great twitter storm surrounded the Pac-16, and we were collectively amused. That is, if you were not a Big 12 member.
The next great unsourced event is underway with Cam Newton. We see a rush to judgment -- fueled perhaps by fear of the revelations of Reggie Bush -- and real-time reporting is right in the middle.
This is troubling on many levels in the collegiate realm. Today, by laying out an academic accusation, those that could quickly deal with this are put at some jeopardy via FERPA. Nature and the Internet abhor a vacuum, it will be filled.
That said, Auburn has taken steps to aggressively counter, including the athletic director Jay Jacobs and football coach Gene Chizik making strong statements to the media. After last week's NCAA rumors, Newton himself was made available. For its part, Florida, via Urban Meyer, has done the same. Interestingly, Auburn's official feed is only retweeting other media. That should not be read into, however, as their feed has traditionally been promotions based for it's original material. The fact they are making sure message gets out to fan base by retweeting stories shows they are engaging.
There has to be a little understanding of the demand on the media, and all sides are ratcheting up rhetoric. As an example, Chris Dufresne of the L.A. Times is getting hit pretty hard by fans. Dick Weiss with New York Dailey News points out both sides -- noting the FERPA issues and statements from Jay Jacobs -- The people you would expect like Paul Finebaum are in the eye of the storm.
In light of being burned on Farve via paid sources, are national outlets moving faster than normal in ways that are over compensating for that miss, or are we simply in the heart of a new paradigm that will require institutions to have rapid response and monitoring teams that can move quickly.
Again, we are not talking professional sports or professional entertainment -- for that matter, even government crisis events -- where once the problem unfolds there can be rapid reactions. Colleges are both academic institutions and state governing bodies. Legally and culturally, they are not rapid reaction targets.
Before the next Pac-16 or Cam, have you assessed your organization's ability to react at the speed that a university is being forced to move?
Tuesday, November 09, 2010
Eye of the Hurricane
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2 comments:
Yes we are being forced to move at a rapid pace--not something a university is used to. But, in this day and age when word-of-mouth is elevated to the same level as journalism via social media and such, it demands that we school ourselves in rapid crisis communications methods while protecting the student-athlete's privacy and right to due process. What bothers me about this whole deal is the timing. Heisman trophy voting anyone?
I agree, and from the outside looking in, I see several of the parties involved -- Auburn, Florida, State -- reacting pretty quickly. It shows all of us the speed at which the opinions are made -- the Golden Hour really means just that now, and it takes on the true life-safety context of need to respond within the first 60 minutes.
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