Twitter Usage

[RMH44]

*walks in, sees someone actually called the compliance department*

Well...at least he owned-up to it. I have a feeling he isn't alone.

 

[oldpinepoint]

I equate this to driving your car. 99.9% of us probably speed, however most of us don't get caught. Same thing with this twitter debate. I just choose to ignore it. Now I don't contact recruits however I do follow them.

 

[anomander]

Well...at least he owned-up to it. I have a feeling he isn't alone.

Unless it was something you were considering doing I have no idea why anyone would call the compliance department. is this like golf where the fans can call in and self report a recruiting violation?

 

[javadoc]

Unless it was something you were considering doing I have no idea why anyone would call the compliance department. is this like golf where the fans can call in and self report a recruiting violation?

It answered a question I had, since the answer was not written down anywhere on the AD website that I could find. And since the mods will ban people who violate the official policy, it was at least informative to have it confirmed, don't you think?

 

[Orangepace]

It answered a question I had, since the answer was not written down anywhere on the AD website that I could find. And since the mods will ban people who violate the official policy, it was at least informative to have it confirmed, don't you think?

I thought the original post was obnoxious. I'm happy you called to take it up a notch.

 

[Toga]

I agree with your line of reasoning in this thread. It seems obvious that the NCAA crafted these rules about booster contact during recruiting in a pre-Twitter world. Twitter has exploded on the scene and has been quickly adopted, especially by the younger generations (lets face it, the NCAA honchos aren't exactly wet behind the ears). Before Twitter, the masses did not have access to recruits, so the NCAA regulations and definitions of who is a booster made sense. In the post Twitter reality, the masses and the recruits can interact freely in the massive chatroom that is Twitter. It makes the pre-Twitter NCAA regulations and definitions obsolete and effectively unenforceable.

As mentioned by Anomander in the post I quoted, when it comes to coaches and their contact with recruits, the NCAA can reasonably expect certain rules and standards to be met and enforced (although this has proven slippery on its own). In the old days, it was reasonable to expect a school to keep a leash on some of their high rolling, passionate, very involved boosters and imputed knowledge of their impermissible actions to the school. But now? How in the world could any reasonable person conclude that ANY school could possibly keep a leash on Twitter participants? Especially when recruits often solicit the attention? It is simply laughably absurd to think the NCAA could possibly try to regulate and enforce bans on fans tweeting at recruits. We literally would be in a world where each and every member institution would have sanctions/be on probation. Even if, hypothetically, a school wielded such control as to prevent their entire fan base from tweeting at recruits, rival fans could easily create dummy accounts and make violations on behalf of the school. The NCAA ALREADY is woefully understaffed when it comes to monitoring and enforcement. Monitoring the Twitter feeds of each recruited athlete would take a ridiculous amount of manpower, not to mention the fact that the NCAA lacks subpoena power or other mechanisms to uncover the real names and addresses of the anonymous hordes of fans who tweet at recruits.

In short, this whole thing is just a charade. The NCAA knows it can't enforce these overly broad and now outdated and obsolete definitions of booster, which include Twitter activity by random fans toward recruits. This is obvious by their lack of action in the face of widespread overwhelming activity by fans of schools all across the country. That the NCAA is slow to update or change the regulation should come as no surprise. Institutions such as the NCAA are not known for their speed at adaption. The hand wringing in this thread is overwrought and seems to stem from the fact that somehow the NCAA will turn a blind eye toward the Twitter activity of every other school's fan base but will hammer Syracuse with sanctions. Frankly, that idea is nothing short of paranoid.

For those arguing "rules are rules", to me, this is more akin to those dumb outdated laws that are technically still on the books but are widely ignored for obvious reasons. For instance, in Eureka, Nevada it is illegal for men who have mustaches to kiss women. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumb_laws I somehow doubt we'd have an impassioned plea of "its the law, if you don't follow this one well, how do we know we're not going to allow murder next?" The NCAA's overly broad definition of booster is as outdated and unenforceable as this Eureka, Nevada law.

http://video.search.yahoo.com/video...99fvs&pstcat=politics&age=0&fr=yfp-t-900&tt=b

 

[javadoc]

I thought the original post was obnoxious. I'm happy you called to take it up a notch.

I'm sorry that trying to make sure that the athletic department isn't getting itself into trouble offends you.

 

[anomander]

mind you this is from 2011, so you know it's been going on for a while. But look at the quote from the NCAA saying it is the schools responsibility to police, but is almost impossible

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/18/sports/ncaabasketball/18recruiting.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

 

[Orangetradition44]

It's a chicken little, the sky is falling, mountain out of a mole-hill, conspiracy theorist, black helicopters tone. You called the CO to report our coaches twitter habits. I can't believe you are feeling even-handed. This obsession seems a lot stranger to me than people who tweet our recruits.

I know you're a great fan and a great board member... I'm just dumbfounded by this thread.

Tone? I think my tone is even-handed..

 

[Orangepace]

I'm sorry that trying to make sure that the athletic department isn't getting itself into trouble offends you.

The athletic dept isn't. White hasn't done anything wrong according to the definition you posted. He's not tweeting them directly. I can't say if he's DMing them, but I have to believe he's in compliance if he's not even mentioning them by name.

 

[Orangetradition44]

It's not offensive. It seems a little arrogant and delusional though. Basically, your going with the logic that you know better than our AD and coaching staff, that our staff is willfully breaking rules, lying about it, and flaunting it in the local paper. Oh, and that the CO has never heard of twitter and doesn't read the post standard.

But you will save the day and keep us from sliding into the death penalty due to these egregious acts.

Again, dumbfounded.

I'm sorry that trying to make sure that the athletic department isn't getting itself into trouble offends you.

 

[javadoc]

You called the CO to report our coaches twitter habits.

What? I called the AD to ask what their official policy is on fans contacting recruits through Twitter. I guess I didn't state that. Sorry for the confusion!

 

[rrlbees]

i have a feeling the staff is thoroughly documenting exactly what they are doing on twitter.

the only way the NCAA could possibly monitor this would be punishing the player. sure you aren't going to stop fans from tweeting at players, but a players eligibility could be put up to question if he acknowledges (follow/retweet/favorite/reply) the fan . that way there will be no communication from fans on a prospects timeline. otherwise there is no way to police this, absolutely none.

to be on an even playing field i am happy to see the fan base getting involved. until the ncaa takes a solid stance i hope i continue to see it.

Surprised you take a stance that is counter to what SU asks fans to take.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[rrlbees]

What's one have to do with the other? Why ban on a message board? I don't tweet, but don't see the linkage really.

SU says not to do it so we shouldn't condone it and allow members to even if it sounds like a stupid unenforceable rule. Surprised at the number of people who in reality are saying screw what SU says we can do it because everyone else does.




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[tep624]

It's a chicken little, the sky is falling, mountain out of a mole-hill, conspiracy theorist, black helicopters tone. You called the CO to report our coaches twitter habits. I can't believe you are feeling even-handed. This obsession seems a lot stranger to me than people who tweet our recruits.

I know you're a great fan and a great board member... I'm just dumbfounded by this thread.

You honestly think he called the SU compliance office to report twitter "violations" by our staff? And you're calling HIM delusional? Holy stuff.

 

[spo023]

SU says not to do it so we shouldn't condone it and allow members to even if it sounds like a stupid unenforceable rule. Surprised at the number of people who in reality are saying screw what SU says we can do it because everyone else does.




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

But there's a difference between not condoning it and actively enforcing against it. I feel, as your job, you should politely ask people on this forum to not post their tweets and responses to recruits here as it goes against SU policy, but to ban people who do tweet at recruits is going a step further. SU tells students not to smoke marijuana, or even cigarettes near the entrances to dorms, but are you going to ban all your users that do smoke marijuana and cigarettes. Just because SU tells it's fans not to do something doesn't mean SYRACUSEFAN.COM should be the one who has to lay down the law for them.

I know that's a ridiculous comparison (I really didn't feel like thinking too hard on this one, sorry), but the point I'm trying to make is that it shouldn't be Syracusefan.com's job to say what we can and can not say, unless Syracuse University is paying to keep this website runnning

 

[anomander]

Surprised you take a stance that is counter to what SU asks fans to take.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

i guess i got crossed up since the football staff has encouraged the opposite.

 

[javadoc]

i guess i got crossed up since the football staff has encouraged the opposite.

Yep! Which was the original point of the thread.

There has been a lot of great information and opinion in this thread, IMO. This was a fantastic discussion and debate. All along, my concern was that we were setting ourselves up for trouble.

 

[ImperialOrange]

What's twitter?

 

[Orangetradition44]

He DID call the CO. The whole point of his thread is discussing the "violations" by the STAFF, not fans. So yes, without his clarification, that's exactly what I honestly thought.

You honestly think he called the SU compliance office to report twitter "violations" by our staff? And you're calling HIM delusional? Holy stuff.

 

[Orangepace]

SU says not to do it so we shouldn't condone it and allow members to even if it sounds like a stupid unenforceable rule. Surprised at the number of people who in reality are saying screw what SU says we can do it because everyone else does.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Again, why must you enforce a rule... it's SU's compliance department's issue. If they want the SUTwitterArmy to stop, why don't they take out an ad in the local newspaper asking fans not to do so? Also, it's a rule, not a law. I don't condone a person having 2 beers and then driving home, but it's not my business.

We are not an extension of the University. We are fans of the University. The rules don't apply to us, they apply to the University. If the COmpliance Department thought this was a big deal, they'd take action. Not sure why you all feel the need to police it..

You mods proclaim..."If it's found that you are tweeting potential recruits, your account will be banned." How is that any different than internet bullying?

 

[leftytg]

This whole thing is just a silly tap dance that everyone knows is silly, but has to do because change with the NCAA moves at a glacier pace.

- Syracuse University cannot stop any individual fans from tweeting at recruits. The NCAA knows this and knows they can't punish schools for things wholly, entirely out of their control.
- Because of this, the NCAA throws its hands up in the air and say it is up to each member institution to enforce the ban. The NCAA doesn't even try to stop it themselves.
- Ergo, Syracuse University has to publicly say "tsk tsk tsk please stop" to appease the NCAA, while in reality they know they can't stop anyone and honestly, they kinda like the fact that the fan base is showing love to recruits.
- As evidenced by the complete and total lack of NCAA action on the part of fans tweeting at recruits, the NCAA is satisfied with this fiction.

It is silly. The whole thing is just a charade. The sensible thing to do would be to just amend the definition of booster to not include random fans without any kind of meaningful, influential connection to the program and exclude Twitter messages. But the NCAA has chosen to ignore their own rules instead of changing them. So be it. But all the controversy and gnashing of teeth about this on the forum is overwrought.

For the record, I have never so much as followed a recruit on Twitter let alone even considered tweeting at one. It just isn't my thing. But, as a fan of the program who wants to see them recruit as well as possible, I'm glad those people do exist.

 

[anomander]

This whole thing is just a silly tap dance that everyone knows is silly, but has to do because change with the NCAA moves at a glacier pace.

- Syracuse University cannot stop any individual fans from tweeting at recruits. The NCAA knows this and knows they can't punish schools for things wholly, entirely out of their control.
- Because of this, the NCAA throws its hands up in the air and say it is up to each member institution to enforce the ban. The NCAA doesn't even try to stop it themselves.
- Ergo, Syracuse University has to publicly say "tsk tsk tsk please stop" to appease the NCAA, while in reality they know they can't stop anyone and honestly, they kinda like the fact that the fan base is showing love to recruits.
- As evidenced by the complete and total lack of NCAA action on the part of fans tweeting at recruits, the NCAA is satisfied with this fiction.

It is silly. The whole thing is just a charade. The sensible thing to do would be to just amend the definition of booster to not include random fans without any kind of meaningful, influential connection to the program and exclude Twitter messages. But the NCAA has chosen to ignore their own rules instead of changing them. So be it. But all the controversy and gnashing of teeth about this on the forum is overwrought.

For the record, I have never so much as followed a recruit on Twitter let alone even considered tweeting at one. It just isn't my thing. But, as a fan of the program who wants to see them recruit as well as possible, I'm glad those people do exist.

every word of this is dead on. And to build on it I have no doubt Eric White gets everything approved before he does a thing. This is ok'd in house, but has to take this stance with the public

 

[rrlbees]

We are not an extension of the University. We are fans of the University. The rules don't apply to us, they apply to the University.

Really? The rules don't apply to fans? Fans, boosters, donors are 1/2 the problem. Are you an SU season ticket holder? A donor? Have you never gotten their mailings about compliance as a fan, booster, donor?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Orangepace]

Really? The rules don't apply to fans? Fans, boosters, donors are 1/2 the problem. Are you an SU season ticket holder? A donor? Have you never gotten their mailings about compliance as a fan, booster, donor?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

First, I repeat. I have in no way contacted recruits, through the use of social media or otherwise. I do have season tickets and am a donor. i have never seen a mailing about compliance.

Next, yes the rules don't apply to fans. If I break a rule, I don't pay fines, nor am I subject to any criminal proceedings. As such, it doesn't apply to me other than through being a fan of the program. They can yank my season tickets, can ban me from games/campus and could sue me for damages, though it'd be a waste of their time, money. Those to who it applies are the only ones that will feel the heavy consequences, the program.

Thanks for not addressing the point I was arguing though.