ESPN and ethics

I, like the fashion major, do not frequently watch ESPN. I will admit I’m not a big sports fan and thus watching ESPN for me will often lead to a spontaneous afternoon nap.

So I’m going to focus on the last few questions we were given in class today regarding ESPN and its policies with reporters.

Should ESPN reporters be able to tweet breaking news stories?

In my personal life I will admit that I often first hear about major news stories from social media sources like Facebook and Twitter. Whether it be who won an election, which celebrity is going to rehab or who won yesterdays game, I hear all about it on Twitter.  

So to say reporters for ESPN are not allowed to tweet something unless it comes from espn.com or a press release first is, pardon my lack of eloquent diction, stupid. If the facts are there, why not tweet about it? If anything, tweeting about a breaking news story will only encourage its Twitter followers to continue to look to the ESPN Twitter account for more information on the story.

Although I jump around to different news outlets when following a breaking story, I always check back to the original source more frequently. Say ESPN broke a story first over Twitter, I would be more likely to look to ESPN for updates on that particular story.

Would I break ESPN policy and break a story over Twitter?

Well like we talked about in class, if your job is to be the first to break a new story then how does ESPN expect its reporters to get content up if all they are carrying is a cell phone?

If reporters for other news outlets were all tweeting around me, I would feel almost embarrassed because I couldn’t get on the story as quickly. I do not, however, feel that I would break ESPN policy. Firstly, it’s a policy and it’s there for a reason. Secondly, I would not want to break the rules of the company that is providing a paycheck for me.

Should ESPN reporters be able to write about sports-related topics on their personal blogs?

I can clearly see how this can be a problem for both sides of the argument. If I were a higher up at ESPN I would not want my reporters blogging about what they cover for my news outlet. If your contract says you can’t write for other news outlets about the topic of sports, then I could see why ESPN would not allow sports related personal blogs. Although a personal blog is not an accredited news source, it can still be considered a news outlet.

On the other side of the issue, I would be quite angry to be a reporter for ESPN and not be able to have a personal sports blog. Blogging, to me, can be your opinions that you would normally not be allowed to express for work. Writing for ESPN, a reporter could be considered a sports “expert” and as an expert they are the perfect people to write a sports blog.

If the content does not mention ESPN negatively and is not affiliated with ESPN, then I really feel they should be able to have personal sports blogs. Would you rather read a sports blog from a legitimate sports reporter? Or some middle-aged man writing in his basement?

But the obvious loophole to this problem is to just have your personal sports blog be anonymous.