As the highest-paid player on the Browns, is Joe Thomas’ value diminishing?
April 9, 2013Cavaliers eye Otto Porter according to Chad Ford mock draft
April 9, 2013The landscape of how we watched sports has been forever changed by the Internet and social media. Twitter in particular has made sporting events even more of a communal experience, especially with fans spread throughout the country (and the world for that matter).
I love being able to see what people inside of a stadium or an arena have to say about the game as it happens. Getting injury updates instantly from sideline reporters tweeting out info has become par for the course. Take last night’s NCAA Men’s Basketball National Title game for example. Inside of the Georgia Dome were hoards of media, many tweeting out their thoughts and observations of that fantastic action between Louisville and Michigan. Whether it was CBS’s Jeff Goodman, SI’s Seth Davis, ESPN’s Fran Fraschilla, or the local flavor of 92.3 The Fan’s Anthony Lima, the tweets were insightful and entertaining, adding to the game-watching experience.
Hours earlier, one of the biggest events of the year in downtown Cleveland, Opening Day for the Indians, took place. More than 41,000 fans packed Progressive Field to see the Wahoos take on the Yankees. But again, not every Tribe fan can be there. I lived in Chicago for nine years and did my best to get to a bar and watch the game or had I would buy the MLB package on DirecTV or Digital Cable if I could get it. With Twitter now, my friends in Chicago, New York, LA, and Seattle can all get not only watch the game with one of these services or the MLB At-Bat iPad app, but they can get in on some good insight and back and forth with people inside of  Progressive Field. People like me.
Because of my affiliation with Waiting For Next Year, I often tweet during Browns and Indians games that I either watch on TV or attend in person. On top of that, I’m usually receiving texts and/or emails from my friends who I am not with. Again, its the communal experience at its finest. Two of the bigger Tribe fans I know – my brother and my close friend Brian – live elsewhere, but so many times the text/twitter/email abilities make it feel like they are next to me.  I love interacting with readers of WFNY and my Twitter followers who either agree with me or take me to task on something I may put out there.
Then there is the other side of it:  uploads. According to a signalshare.com article, at this year’s NBA All-Star game, uploads — sending out pics and tweets — actually exceeded downloads. In addition to using their phones to reads tweets and emails, fans inside Houston’s Toyota Center were sharing their in-game experience and promoting what was happening on the court, generating buzz for the league and its teams.
The home opener is probably the biggest Twitter day for a baseball team. Yesterday was Cleveland’s turn. I had my phone fully charged to 100% because as a veteran of sporting events in the smartphone era, I know how quickly the battery can drain. Even before I entered Progressive Field, I couldn’t send out an email. My first two tweets came back in error, saying there was a network issue. And again, this was an hour before first pitch and I was walking through the plaza between The Q and Progressive Field.
This season, I moved into a new group of shared season tickets. I took a picture with my son in the new seats to send to my wife.  The text didn’t go through. I tried email. That didn’t work either.  As the game started and Ubaldo JimĂ©nez reverted back to his 2012 form, I wanted to see what the Tribe beat writers were saying about what they were seeing with him. I tried Twitter, but couldn’t get it to work.  I went into my settings to search for a WiFi network inside of the Stadium. Their wasn’t an open or free one available. Our own Scott, who works three blocks away from Progressive Field, had his signal jammed up at his office!
So I went old school, put my phone in my pocket and left it there. The good news was that there was no emergency with my family, because there was no way my wife or anyone else for that matter was getting in touch with me. While my phone showed full bars, you could not make an outgoing call or receive an incoming call if you needed one.
This seems to happen every Opening Day at Progressive Field and then it usually goes away for a while, and pops back up on Friday night and Saturday night games during the summer when the crowd reaches 25-30,000 fans. That is obviously no excuse. In today’s information-now world, to not have even a semi-strong cell phone service available in the middle of a midwestern downtown area is a gigantic failure.
The issue goes on eight Sundays a year down at the Lakefront for Browns games as well. Anyone who has a Verizon phone knows what I am talking about. Like yesterday at the Tribe opener, texts, tweets, and emails go unsent and unread for hours. Phone calls do not come in or go out.
The Indians asked their fans yesterday to Tweet out their smartphone pictures with the hashtag #TribeTown and then they would put them on the scoreboard. I didn’t see more than two or three images go up, because nobody could get their phones to work. Every in-game tweet, Instagram Photo, Twitpic upload, etc, is all free marketing for the Indians. They are one of the most progressive franchises in terms of their use of social media, yet inside the stadium, their users couldn’t get a signal. This will improve when the crowds get smaller, but you miss a golden opportunity on Opening Day of all days.
I emailed the Indians Senior Vice President of Public Affairs, the man behind all of the Indians public relations, Bob Dibiasio and asked him for his take on why the cell phone service was so poor yesterday and why the Tribe does not offer free public WiFi inside of Progressive Field. He said, “we do recognize the cell and WiFi service is a concern of our fans; we are working with MLB to address the issue of connectivity not only here in Cleveland but in all MLB ballparks.”
The NFL has been more out in front of this issue. The handheld FanVision technology is available to all Browns fans and works inside the stadium on a WiFi connection supplied by the team. Patriots Owner Robert Kraft is leading the charge to put free WiFi in all NFL stadiums while taking advantage of its abilities in terms or not just replays on a FanVision handheld device, but with the ability to order food and drinks from your seat from a smartphone app.
Said NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell last May:
“We believe that it is important to get technology into our stadiums. We have made the point repeatedly that the experience at home is outstanding, and we have to compete with that in some fashion by making sure that we create the same kind of environment in our stadiums and create the same kind of technology. …We want to make sure our fans, when they come into stadiums, don’t have to shut down.”
Browns President Joe Banner and Owner Jimmy Haslam have hinted that there will be improvements to the First Energy Stadium WiFi connection in 2013. I just would like to see it get to the point that my phone battery doesn’t die in two hours despite not being able to get any sort of data connection to work.
It doesn’t seem to me to be that hard to solve. Lima, who was at the National Title game last night, told me this morning that he used his phone and the free public WiFi connection inside of the Georgia Dome last night with no problems. He also had zero problem receiving or making calls. That was in downtown Atlanta, with 75,000 plus in the same building. Then again, I attended last year’s Kansas/Kentucky National Title game at the Superdome in New Orleans and could not get a signal to work there either.
I know this sounds like a trivial issue to some, but this is 2013. We are all slaves to our smartphones. The Indians push their social media agenda about as well as any team in pro sports, yet they have to recognize and take care of a problem that is right in their backyard.
Literally and figuratively.
82 Comments
few things worse than being in a luxury suite where everyone’s head is down looking at their phones and not the field.
i raise my hand in favor of the indians jamming wi-fi and 4G placing primitive POTS lines in the concourse for the emergencies.
break the tether gents. it’ll be ok to be without twitter for 3 hours. and you’ll enjoy the game more.
This has irked me for the last couple years. I love to take a pic or two while I’m at the game & send it to some out of state Tribe fan relatives who love seeing inside the park. I usually have to wait until I get home to send it because it never sends while I’m there. I often thought the reason is A) because I usually only attend weekend games. And B) I’m usually in the bleachers.
This is a pretty narrow-minded comment. Did you even read the article? The [lack of] cell service – both phone and data – affected the majority of downtown cleveland, NOT just those in Progressive Field. I work downtown – had zero service all day. Upon leaving the city, my phone buzzed for 5-minutes straight with msg’s, txt’s and alerts that had queue’d up through-out the day
I feel so old reading articles like this one and I’m only in my early 30s. When I go to a game, I’m at the game. Sending out a picture is fun, but then it’s all about watching and living in the communal experience. The one where you meet random people in your area and enjoy the game on the field rather than the impersonal visage of the internet.
Yes, I get that it’s strange coming from me since I post so much here. But, I post when I’m tethered to work and this helps me keep sane. When I’m not working, I’m untethered and just enjoying Little League or whatever else life may throw in my direction that day.
as for why it works in some stadiums and not others – it is mostly a product of the surrounding area more than the stadium itself. i posted awhile back going into full detail of the challenges that networking stations have trying to keep up with the exponentially increasing demand for bandwidth, but the main point is simply this:
bandwidth demands have gone up a ton, while it’s expensive and time consuming to build the infrastructure to support it (while also trying to plan for future demands) especially for the NFL which only needs to meet such demand 8 out of 365 days in a year.
It goes so beyond the game itself as well. The younger crowd goes to a Friday/Saturday night game and wants to go out downtown after. Can’t make plans about where everyone is meeting up after if you can’t send messages for 3+ hours. In my mind this is a huge deterrent to going to the game itself.
DOH not in this day how dare they!
Worse yet are the ones in the direct flight of a foul ball down either line. I’m just waiting for the day someone gets killed because they were to busy on their phone. Of course then they can do like hockey and put giant nets up.
How on Earth did you ever survive the day? đ
No one is saying you have to use your phone. Not having the ability to, however, is a detriment regardless of use. To some, sharing moments or getting updates is part of the “enjoyment.”
I am sure that mobile cell towers were brought into ATL for the national championship game last night. Why didnt the Indians do something like that for the ONE game of the year when they knew this would be a problem?
But this seems like a larger problem for the City of Cleveland. The same thing happens on St Patrick’s day and any other time a ton people pour into downtown. This has got to be fixed.
Whether we like it or not, professional sport target demo is 18-35. This demographic uses their cell phones for a variety of activities, some more productive than others. As TD stated, it’s an inconvenience to all parties as paying customers cannot send or receive correspondence; the team misses out on free marketing. This will get rectified eventually, but it’s a shame it took this long and only one owner has ponied up for the infrastructure.
OH MY GOD I CAN’T TALK ON MY TELEPHONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
AND I CAN’T TWEET!!!!!
I’M JUST STUCK HERE WATCHING A GAME!!!
When reached for comment, Bud Selig said, “The Internet? That old thing’s still around?”
I thought he might try and say he invented it!
There must be somebody you could sue.
Actually in a game like yesterday I probably wouldn’t have minded some Star Wars Angry Birds myself! đ
I’d be curious how much trouble people like Scott had blocks away from the stadium during their normal workdays yesterday. If you were at work and weren’t getting texts/calls, then in my mind this is moving from a Cleveland Indians problem to a City of Cleveland problem.
Or even an AT&T/Verizon problem.
I’m poking fun I’m a fantasy/stat nut but lets all admit this craze of being able to access stuff has gotten way out of hand. God forbid the show “Revolution” ever happens. Note: when I lose power, which seems to be more frequent now even if it’s just windy, I am completely lost.
For a franchise that prides itself on its social media initiatives, this simply seems counter-productive. And this issue didn’t just creep up on them. It has been a problem for a while. If they have aspirations of making the playoffs, they need to address the problem. It’s one thing to annoy the local media with poor press box wifi, it is another to do it on a national level.
Really???? A huge deterrent???
For a hundred years, people somehow managed to make plans and meet up without sending messages during games.
Sheesh!
CLEVELAND–Scores of emergency medical teams were rushed to Progressive Field today to treat a mass outbreak of hysterical convulsions.
At the scene, doctors found thousands of alleged baseball fans in the throes violent shaking and severe vomiting, while others lay on the ground completely paralyzed. All were clutching cell phones with . . . with . . . FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MAN, WITH NO BARS!!!!!!
O the humanity!
Seriously, you phone drones are weak.
Random thoughts.
I do agree that if you aren’t making your teams venue as tech friendly as possible you are failing severely as a team owner. Convincing people to come to a game is getting harder, and like it or not, people want this service.
I find it funny to classify “going old school” as being without cell service. Really takes me back to those wild and wooly early oughts.
I also find it funny, and this must not be generational because I bet I’m the same age as TD or at least within a decade, nonetheless I find it funny that ignoring the people around you, and missing live game action in order to send smarmy blurbs or “updates” is considered being Communal. To me at least ignoring the people you went to an event with to concentrate on a detached form of communication with people 1000’s of miles away – some of whom you never nor ever will meet – seems the antithesis of communal. I get the jist of the argument but I’ll never be convinced.
Finally,
I suggest TD and anyone else who really feels put out by 3 hours without phone service to go over to Frowns piece today bringing attention to Autism Awareness month. I don’t mean to flame this piece, but if you can read that father’s story, and still get worked up over not seeing your tweets on the big screen at the park you are shallow at best, but more likely leaning towards vacuous.
He cried in a whisper as his sent image was returned – he cried at the lack of tweeting. He cried out twice, a cry that was no more than a breath – The horror, the horror!
“I know this sounds like a trivial issue to some, but this is 2013. We are all slaves to our smartphones.”
Blech. Yuck. Tha’s just turrible.
You are only a slave to your smartphone (or any material thing) if you choose to be one.
If only real salvery had an “off” button.
Or did they? Maybe nobody ever really made plans or met up. Did you think of that?
People managed to get around without planes & cars too so does that mean we shouldn’t use those either?
The technology is there, everyone has the devices, it’s beneficial to the fan and to the team. It makes no sense to not have it, basically.
You’re missing the point Mr C, we had “bars” yesterday, just no service. You’d think youda picked that up by now.
“This is a pretty narrow-minded comment.”
Was this a post-script or an introduction?
Why not both?
I’d like to see less of that younger crowd.
We need another Iraq to thin those ranks out a bit.
Oh, the humanity!
If you’re a fan of baseball, you should be able to enjoy the game like people have for 130 years: without your head staring at your crotch half the time. I get the publicity and interactivity aspect, but nobody needs to tweet the pitch-by-pitch. If you care enough to know, you’re watching or following online anyway. I hate people texting me while at a game, truth be told.
Did somebody say “lawsuit?”
“If they have aspirations of making the playoffs, they need to address the problem.”
I thought they just needed better starting pitching!
I would go to that Frowns piece, but the browser on my smartphone is down. So . . .
No, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t use them. It means that if you don’t have them on any particular day, you shouldn’t turn into a quivering, helpless mess unable to function or incapable of enjoying the moment.
ouch
I think it’s only right that smoke signals be used at Progressive Field! Not meant as any slight towards my Native American brothers and sisters.
Obviously Scott hasn’t gotten to know you yet! ;o)
I’m a slave to the ladies! Hey now.
Thank God Dice-K didn’t make the team otherwise you could have added world wide level!
i’ll bet they have better cell service in the African jungles!!!!
That’s not what you said yesterday . . .
Crazy that you have to wait until you get home to send the photos!
Not too long ago, if you took a photo at a game and wanted to send it to someone, you’d have to finish the roll, send it to a developer, wait a week, then go to the post office. And that was a luxury!
We’re so soft.
win 100+ games, get in world series, people (even the young target demos) will come.
win 68 games and they won’t.
there’s no magic beans here.
let’s get the tribe in the playoffs first and we can risk the poor pressbox wifi outfall from national media later.
lol.. in fact, i DARE buster olney to crap over the indians first world series win in 65 years with a bitchy ‘bad wifi column.’ DARE HIM.
I was on a Tribe high (Kool-Aid was flowin’) yesterday everything is a blur, did we win? ;o)
Well, Michigan lost. That counts as a “win.”
(I was actually refering to your “master debater” comment. See what I did there?)
I had Louisville (who didn’t?) so I’m happy. Easy on the “master debating” I heard you could go blind!