BTN Contact Info
So I played around with web surfing and came up with some contact info for the BTN. You can use the Contact Form . It has a 500 character limit though, which really didn't do justice to the amount of bitching I want to do. So I opted to email my bitch in to : [email protected] with a request they forward it up to Mark Silverman, the CEO. I figure I'll be lucky to get his executive assistant to read my email, but what the hell. The BTN executives can be found here.
You can also find the BTN on Twitter and Facebook. A good method to ensure someone actually notices that you're grumpy might be to tag BTN reporters when you complain on Twitter, as odds are they actually read their feeds (as opposed to executive assistants). This helps increase the odds some BTN employee will pass our unhappiness up the food chain.
Perhaps more germane is the Michigan Athletic Department staff list, here. I copied my email over to the AD Media Relation folks to let them know I was unhappy with the network. The tone I took in my complaint was along the lines of "Having your staff spew out rumors that a group of bloggers can disprove in a few hours does not make your network look credible.".
I didn't do any grandstanding and piss and moan about how I'm going to boycott the BTN. We all know I'll watch whenever they carry a live Michigan game. Rather my point was having low quality and unprofessional talent ensures I'll keep watching SportsCenter and ABC/ESPN college football pregames and news shows. The BTN is offering zero incentive for me to switch to their shows when they employee idiots that Tweet without confirming. The fact I don't watch means lower ratings, which means advertisers pay less and the BTN makes less. Hammer that point home. Also if they don't have strong fan support, the have less leverage to make Comcast keep them on the basic package where they make the most money.
So if you want to complain, feel free to use those links. I'll let you know if I get anything beyond a canned "Thanks for your comment" response.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:34 AM ^
...I like it.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:36 AM ^
Well said. Credibility is essential because as a viewer, you want to have trust and faith in your sources. From here on out, anything that the BTN reports is going to come across as, "eh, it' just the BTN, it won't have legs". Granted ESPN and other outlets have messed up (ahem, Les Miles) but ESPN is already established. BTN can't afford to begin their network with random rumors.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:40 AM ^
ESPN ran with a day long Favre retirement piece off from one text saying "this is it." How ESPN has any credibility is beyond me.
This just in: I may or may not have just farted in my cubicle.
/totally did.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:54 AM ^
Worst spot to do it -- dutch oven and gradually seeps over the outer walls.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:56 AM ^
I fart all day long at my desk. It's very liberating to just let 'em fly as they come.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:39 AM ^
I thought you would be giving out professional hot chicks digits here. Bummer. Let me know when you get the real contact info.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:40 AM ^
She's just a young woman(really hot) trying to make it in a rough-and-tumble, dog eat dog world.
She's also really hot.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:47 AM ^
Her hotness is not in question, her credibility as a reporter is.
She deserves to be reprimanded at the very least for reporting this nonsense. I don't care if she's going to play the unconfirmed card.
If she can't cut it as a reporter, she should re-evaluate her career. Perhaps model or run an escort service.
August 19th, 2010 at 12:02 PM ^
Well then I stand corrected.
August 19th, 2010 at 12:04 PM ^
Sorry James, I have no clue if you're being sarcastic or not. Much easier to figure out in person.
August 19th, 2010 at 12:22 PM ^
I was being sarcastic. I'm not tht upset about Melanie's lack of journalistic rigor, though. She made a dumb mistake and we're all on edge given Troy's injury and the past two horrific years...so, it compounded the reaction.
August 19th, 2010 at 12:14 PM ^
When she bares fake tweets it's simply upsetting. I'd like to know that the quality of her tweets is undeniable - surely that's what many fans here feel as well about Melanie.
August 19th, 2010 at 12:58 PM ^
It's true that Melanie is in a dog eat dog world. But is she wearing milk-bone underwear?
August 19th, 2010 at 10:44 AM ^
The BTN is offering zero incentive for me to switch to their shows when they employee idiots that Tweet without confirming. The fact I don't watch means lower ratings, which means advertisers pay less and the BTN makes less. Hammer that point home. Also if they don't have strong fan support, the have less leverage to make Comcast keep them on the basic package where they make the most money.
Glad you told me. I thought we all wanted BTN to have high ratings and get into more markets and make more money.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:52 AM ^
No, I just want them to hire better talent. They're handing out checks for ~$20 million to every B10 school. They can afford to get some actual reporters that do things like "fact checking".
To clarify: PH posts this up, it starts blowing up on Michigan blogs and then she deletes the post. To me this says she knew it was sketchy from the minute she posted it. She never tried to defend it or stand by her source, the minute she was called on it, she deleted it. Then this morning she posted something along the lines of "Just because because I posted it on my official Twitter page doesn't mean it was official." That's just shoddy work all around.
If you're a journalist and you're going to post osmething, you should be secure in your sources before you hit the post button. Maybe I'm cynical, but I feel like she was trying to get a little attention with a BS rumor and she panicked when people like Brian and SBNation rolled in on this.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:53 AM ^
it's an obvious case of "i somehow don't understand that putting something on Twitter classifies as professional product." she seems to blame the fanbase and public at large for not understanding she was just "putting what she heard out there" when she doesn't understand the very machine she works for. it's on-par with a coach not understanding why his messy divorce proceeding has any relevance to his on-field performance ("if he speaks to his wife that way, how is he speaking to the kids?" etc etc). it's borderline cluelessness and i would say this about the reporter male OR female. it's not a case of dumb blonde, it's a case of dumb.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:20 AM ^
She tweeted about a "reliable" source, and she's now shocked - SHOCKED! - people were inferring some kind of inside, reliable information from it. Just saying "unconfirmed" after saying it's a "reliable source" doesn't excuse the dust up, (you caused) sweetheart.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:57 AM ^
BTN told her to take it down.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:44 AM ^
We don't want the BTN to fail, but like any company, if you're not satisfied with their product, or are angry with a false report, you write in and complain. This isn't a Freep style jihad or anything, just anger at poor reporting.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:50 AM ^
I'm pretty sure that "Melony" has already been severely reprimanded by the bigwigs at BTN, but I guess a fecal storm of email to drive the point home never hurts.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:53 AM ^
I'm pretty sure that "Melony" has already been severely reprimanded by the bigwigs at BTN
Yeah I gotta agree with you there... I understand what we're trying to do here but I think we should just move on and let the station give her a slap on the wrist. It was a screw-up, sure, but it's nothing that anyone should lose their job over. I have no problem with you guys writing in, but I'm gonna live and let live for now.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:01 AM ^
pretty cool
August 19th, 2010 at 10:53 AM ^
somebody at Michigan (staff, AD office) has fed this to the B10 reporter. Shouldn't this person be the source of our anger, and not the messenger?
August 19th, 2010 at 10:55 AM ^
graduated from PSU in 2008 and has limited/zero contact with UM as a professional (she worked for PSU's extension of BTN). she then worked for NBA tv or something to that effect. the fact is she has no sort of 'pedigree' that would make her having 'sources capable of reporting this' credible.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:01 AM ^
It is a reporter's job to figure out what is valid and what isn't. For example I work for UMHS, so if I told you "Fire ants are nesting in the brains of our patients", you could report that a "Source at the University of Michigan said fire ants are eating the brains of the patients."
However it is expected that you fact check and verify what I just told you, as opposed to running off to publish some bullshit story one low level employee fed you.
/There are no fire ants
//They're actually carpenter ants
August 19th, 2010 at 12:48 PM ^
He just reported that they were in fact carpenter ants and that the red ants were going to be the defensive coordinator...It's a done deal man.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:49 AM ^
Or some other "reliable source" with a tangential Michigan connection, like some alum dude hitting on her in an airport bar. I'm sorry, nothing about her or her tweets gives the slightest indication that she is professional.
Why would anyone in the AD feed this to her? It conflicts with everything else -- coaches talking about him stepping up, his dad talking about how he thinks it's the right approach, the countdown video -- coming out, officially or unofficially.
Attention whore wants attention. She got it. Yay, she wins!
August 19th, 2010 at 10:55 AM ^
Honestly, I think she should be fired. Passing off rumors as actual reporting is completely unprofessional, and undermines the credibility of the network. Just because she's good looking doesn't mean she should face consequences for unsubstantiated rumor-mongering and a retraction that claimed that she wouldn't know that this would cause an issue. I mean really? Just terrible.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:03 AM ^
I think that might be a bit of an over-reaction. This isn't the first time a reporter made a mistake of posting something he/she hadn't yet confirmed, and it won't be the last. She made a mistake, apologized (ish), and wants to move on. If she had run a story on it and come on the BTN talking about it, it'd be one thing. But it was a quick tweet that she got rid of. Twitter is the home of inaccurate reporting, we should just let this one go. She'll get reprimanded, I think that's enough.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:07 AM ^
To be honest, she hasn't handled this very well at all. Maybe she shouldn't be fired, but something needs to happen.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:08 AM ^
I completely agree that something needs to happen, but I think firing is way too harsh here. But either way, this is probably going to be handled internally, and we're probably never going to hear the results of it, so I think we should just let go and trust the BTN officials to take care of it.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:10 AM ^
No reason to fire someone the first time they fuck up. We'd all get fired after a week on the job more than likely in that world.
She needs to get sat down, chewed out a little and made to go learn how to disaster control after you royally fuck up. Attacking the viewing base of your network for example is not a prime example of intelligent spin control.
If she pulls this stunt again, then the BTN should boot her out the door. I figure a lot of her punishment will come from how this reflects on her and the fact that the BTN may opt to assign her lower profile and less glamorous tasks for awhile just to keep her off the radar.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:14 AM ^
Okay, if she's assigned to spend the opening weekend covering the Gophers in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, my thirst for blood will be quenched.
August 19th, 2010 at 12:25 PM ^
She should have to eat nothing but Rotel and Velveeta for two weeks.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:11 AM ^
Can I be on the Punishment Committee? Pretty please?
August 19th, 2010 at 11:21 AM ^
...PSU hat to the next Michigan press conference, she should definitely be fired.
/s
August 19th, 2010 at 11:14 AM ^
I think the mistake everyone's making is in calling her a "reporter." Far as I know, from watching TV at whatever dive bar is open in the AM, all she does is host some show about cooking at tailgates. There was likely never any reason to take anything she said seriously because she is not a reporter and does not have contacts, sources, etc.
But if she must be punished, the BTN should make her host her show in lingerie this season. That's only right and fair.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:22 AM ^
The problem is that a slap on the wrist doesn't mean jack and doesn't offset the benefit of the action in the first place. If she was freelance or a blogger, then she's risking her own credibility in order to raise her profile. OK. But she's an emplyee of the BTN and therefore she's not only risking her credibility but the network's as well. Does everyone at the network get a slap-on-the-wrist card? How many pieces of bad information is that? No, the expectation for inaccuracy in a news organization is ZERO. The fact that we the consumers are so willing to tolerate this level of bullshit is part of the problem.
Canning this woman would definately be an extreme reaction, but it could easily be justified by network executives. Maybe they suspend her for a week or two or indefinately. I, for one, would applaud it. One head rolling down the hallway would send a clear message to all employees of the network, "if you're reporting about Big Ten News in a public forum, you'd better be right." The whole retraction/appology bit is played out and is now completely ineffective; there needs to be more vigorish.
She'd just be the unlucky/thoughtless person that tripped the claymore.
August 19th, 2010 at 10:57 AM ^
has had more people check out her photos in the last 24 than in the previous year. IF the BTN lets her go, and my god why would they, she'll get a new and better job with ease.
PS I also thought I would find her phone number on this post.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:02 AM ^
- Relax with the high school insults and get a grip people. Won't make this mistake again!!
- Twitter is an outlet to post thoughts, provoke conversation & share info I'm hearing. I never once said there was any truth to Forcier rumor
- I NEVER tweeted Forcier was transferring. I tweeted that it was an UNCONFIRMED rumor I had been told yesterday. CLEARLY STATED "UNCONFIRMED"
- A source within UM told me and I shouldn't have tweeted it without confirmation. Wasn't trying to start an uproar.
- My mistake on letting you all in on something I was told today. I did not "report" or "confirm" this information. Simply shared what
- Wow really struck a nerve w/ ppl. Like I said, NOT confirmed. We'll see what plays out.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:05 AM ^
I NEVER tweeted Forcier was transferring. I tweeted that it was an UNCONFIRMED rumor I had been told yesterday. CLEARLY STATED "UNCONFIRMED"This one is my favorite excuse. Her tweet led with the world reliable and then tossed unconfirmed in that the end as kind of a cover your ass. If it was ever so unconfirmed, why did she start out with reliable?
August 19th, 2010 at 11:09 AM ^
The fact that she never said "sorry" got me. Just deflecting the criticism... not very mature IMO.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:31 AM ^
100% agree -- this is making it worse for her. Also -- the fact she posted three things in 10 minutes defending herself. I really wouldn't be surprised if she was canned -- not because of her original statement but her immature tweets right now.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:14 AM ^
Reliable means the source is one you trust and have obtained info from before that turned out to be accurate. Confirmed means you have spoken with one or more official sources and they have confirmed what you were told by an unofficial source.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:38 AM ^
Doesn't she have a manager/producer who, when this broke, should have called her immediately and said, "we F'd up. Say you made a mistake posting unconfirmed rumors but you try to do a good job finding and trusting reliable sources." Stop digging, come clean and move forward. Instead she insults the customers.
If she made the case that she made a good-faith effort to be an honest report, she has nothing to apologize for. Reporters report stuff that turns out to be wrong all the time, as long as they are doing the process right they are doing their job.
It used to be that sideline babes and other weak reporters could be compartmentalized and proofread by editors or producers. but with twitter and blogs, there is little to no administrative/managerial filter between their brains and the world.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:26 AM ^
Alright -- it's one thing to make a mistake and fess up and move on but it's completely unprofessional and ridiculous that she is trying to defend herself via Twitter. I was leaning toward her getting a talking to and moving on but this now has me leaning toward firing her. She is representing the BTN this way? Not smart.
August 19th, 2010 at 11:43 AM ^
I am thinking she is probably not very smart (not confirmed - would love to meet her though and find out)
August 19th, 2010 at 11:46 AM ^
So smart -- telling the public (viewers) to get a grip. Where's the Shooter McGavin, "DAMN YOU PEOPLE! GO BACK TO YOUR SHANTIES!"? Is that next?
August 19th, 2010 at 11:32 AM ^
I mean, could she try and fulfill anymore stereotypes about women we hate?