NFL Players on Twitter

Gothenburg.
The next speaker at AoIR 2010 is Theo Plothe, whose interest is in the use of Twitter by NFL players in the US. The NFL is the most popular league in the US, and players are increasingly participating in it – presumably also encouraged by their employers. NBA player Charlie Villanueva, in fact, was reprimanded for tweeting during a basketball game. NFL players have also been fined, suspended, and fired for tweeting inappropriate comments – and in fact, player Ocho Cinco even orchestrated a post-touchdown celebration with fans via Twitter.

Theo examined some 865 tweets by a range of NFL players, and classified into a number of categories (personal conversations, team-related announcements, promotions and charity events, etc.). Personal conversations with fans (49%) were most prevalent, followed by team-related announcements and other forms. Fan conversations are especially important to keep the fan faith during form slumps, but players are also exposed to fan heckling (and occasionally hit back); other conversations with fans are also about more general topics, though, and depict players as ‘average’ people. Additionally, they also share the happiness or pain over team wins and losses – just like everyday fans.

Players also interact with one another through Twitter, though – dedicating wins to injured team mates, publicly supporting their friends’ teams, etc. What will be interesting to examine is whether technology will continue to mold, define, and assimilate fans’ and players’ identities – how Twitter will be used to create and share fan loyalty around teams.