The value or effectiveness of twitter for teams, athletes and fans continues endlessly, even spurring a Maureen Dowd column about general use in the New York Times. However there is always room for innovation and proof that the simple technology, even without an ad compenent, can have some unique spin. Take the AAA Pacific Coast League Fresno Grizzlies, who last week set up a Twitter Challenge with the front office of the newest PCL member, the Reno Aces. While both teams acknowledge they are using the technology effectively to communicate information and promotions to fans, they are aware of Twitter burnout, turn off or overkill. So the two front offices agreed that the winner of this past weekend's series….the first between the two franchises…would get all their tweets from the series re-sent to the twitter signup list of their opponents on April 30. What does it d. First of all it makes light of the seriousness of the Twitter “era,” showing that the technology is casual social networking and not always intentioned for the hard news sell. Secondly, it gives consumers an idea as to what other information is being communicated through the technology to a different fan base. Third, it created a news hook to drive some casual interest to the media and to fans who may not have known that the teams were even using Twitter as a tool. Fourth, it gives some ancillary added value to those already on the Twitter feed from a team, and can create some fun moments looking back at what was sent. In any event, it again shows the intuitiveness of teams in the minors and their ability to not just use a medium in the traditional manner it was intended for, but to find a way to take it to another level. Twitter wars amongst teams anyon.
