The journalists were asked to discuss the various benefits and pitfalls related to using Twitter, many of which previously came up in the discussion of the uses of Twitter, such as its impact on the dissemination of information in terms of brevity, immediacy and the personal and unfiltered nature of information on the platform. One benefit worth elaborating on further seems to be Twitter’s compatibility with breaking news. Especially for the beat writers, who are expected to wield a certain level of expertise in regards to a certain team, more specifically, or a sport, less specifically, as Stephenson described, “You live in fear that somebody’s going to break a story on Twitter and you’re going to have to drop what you’re doing and immediately chase that story.” Whether such exposure to more information, more rapidly is a benefit or a pitfall seemingly depends on whether a journalists considers keeping up with Twitter a winning or a losing battle. Whereas for Stephenson, it might be considered the latter, for others, such as Holder, it seems to be the former. Holder said, “I need to be up-to-date on what’s going on, and in sports nowadays—for whoever is reading the [NFL’s collective bargaining agreement]
negotiations or what have you—things change by the minute, so you just really have to be on top of it, and that’s what I’ve really been able to use [Twitter] for in large part.”
Another potential benefit for sports writers, according to some of the journalists, is that the type of information for which Twitter is built and the type of information of which sports primarily consists are compatible. As Wise stated, “So much of sports is minutia, and, really, what is Twitter but minutia?” Davidoff elaborated on this subject, using an example from MLB free agency, “Every winter, you know Cliff Lee’s going to sign somewhere. That’s just built for Twitter. There’s going to be a finish line, and there’s going to be a race to see who can report that news first, and Twitter, right now, is the arena where that race is really taking place.” Others,
such as Thompson, see this as a pitfall, however, as he said, “I used to cover the NBA, and I see a lot of NBA writers who will put some pretty miniscule stuff up there like guys signed to 10-day contracts or somebody fined $5,000 for a technical foul. That’s sort of a level of minutia that doesn’t really interest me.” Davidoff’s point about the race to report news is related to another possible benefit of Twitter that is tied to Stephenson’s discussion of the changing notion of the scoop. Where the scoop may be easier to obtain for certain types of journalists over others, or be held for a shorter period of time and therefore less prestigious because of Twitter, the platform certainly provides a clear indication of who got the scoop. As Davidoff said, “Certainly, when you get a story now, you want to tweet it. It’s kind of good, because there’s always this heavy competition, especially, I think, in sports media for who had the story first, and Twitter is kind of the ultimate referee of that.”
Additionally, Thompson brought up the notion of Twitter as a “time suck,” which he labeled as both a potential benefit and a pitfall. The positive side of it is, in his words, “There is never a time now—waiting at the doctor’s office or for an airplane or something—when you don’t have anything to read. There is always something to read, because you can always just pop [Twitter] on your BlackBerry or whatever, and there are writers who you like saying funny and interesting stuff, unless it’s three in the morning or something.” The negative side is, “You can sort of get addicted to that and become antisocial and not interact with human beings while you’re checking your Twitter feed all the time.”
Finally, when considering benefits, Thompson also brought up the question of who Twitter is actually benefitting, connecting to reservations, such as those expressed by Stephenson and Wise, about giving away your best lines. Thompson said:
I think there’s this real conundrum that a lot of them are facing where they’re often getting the news out on Twitter before their own sites, which is kind of stunning if you think about it. You’re basically giving to a third party. It benefits you, but not directly, and it benefits from you, from your work. I think that’s something that I find that we’re still sort of navigating and is a little confusing for people.
What Thompson pointed out, which should not be left absent from a discussion of Twitter’s benefits for sports journalists, is who is actually benefitting more: Twitter—as a brand, as a company, as a service—or journalists? Whereas this project investigates if and how Twitter is impacting sports journalism, another interesting set of research questions left unexplored involve how journalists’ use of Twitter is impacting the brand, company, and/or service itself and why.