BTN Contact Info

Submitted by CRex on

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.

COB

August 19th, 2010 at 11:07 AM ^

while she is employed by the BTN, it's not like they condoned what she did.  I guess I am just not a letter writing type of person but really, what is UM or the BTN going to do?  Nothing.  She won't be fired if that is what you want.  If this is just a way of venting, OK to each their own but this is just like all the phone calls people made to the UM admissions department/admin offices following the DD incident..."thanks, duly noted". 

MrWoodson

August 19th, 2010 at 11:29 AM ^

Every large organization has employees or other people who make mistakes. I expect they have spoken with her about this.

The irony is she was hired because sports fans (like the guys on this board) like to look at hot chicks. If BTN were a radio network, she would not work there. ESPN does it. ABC does it. Every network does it and then we all complain when some of the hot chicks turn out to be not the best "reporters" in the world. Don't come back on the board to complain when you get your wish and they fire her and replace her with another Pam Ward.

GoBlueInNYC

August 19th, 2010 at 11:45 AM ^

I think it may be time to let this go.  She did something stupid, got called out for it, and completely embarrassed herself in the aftermath.  In reality, what did this do to anyone?  Freak you out, provided you managed to catch wind of it during the few hour window between her posting it and retracting it.  Or you thought, "that was fucking stupid..." and then watched the board freak out over basically nothing.  She comes out of this looking like an incompetent idiot, lost what tiny credibility she had, and probably caught a lot of flack for it from her bosses.

As unfair as I think the local (i.e. SE Michigan) media has been to UM in recent years, I think the board/fan base needs to settle down a bit and stop freaking out every time something like this happens.  When it comes to the media, the board has been getting progressively more reactionary, paranoid, whiny, and just straight up irritating.

Wide Open

August 19th, 2010 at 11:59 AM ^

I think they've done a much better job in terms of production.

Personally, I'm fine using this info to piss and moan about them replaying the 2010 Rose Bowl twice a day since January.

genericmichiganfan

August 19th, 2010 at 12:08 PM ^

I know it's been a crappy week and people are touchy, but me thinks some of you are overreacting on this. If she were an actual journalist for the Freep or something and reported this, you may have a point. But she's merely a sometimes reporter for the BTN who simply passed along a rumor on Twitter. Should she have been smarter given she works for the BTN and people will run with it? Yes, but you want her to be fired for it? Come on, it's not like she's pretending to be a journalist that covers Michigan. If you bought the rumor that's your own fault.

And yes, she's really hot, so perhaps I'm biased.

bronxblue

August 19th, 2010 at 12:15 PM ^

I am all for pointing out her poor judgment, but at the same time I think we should kind of let this go.  No real harm occurred, and I don't think getting somebody fired is going to change the fact that UM fans are on edge with all the injuries, transfers, and distractions.  Lets just focus on 9/4 and stop worrying about what outsiders say about the program.

HailGoBlue86

August 19th, 2010 at 12:16 PM ^

She needs to be fired, I mean seriously tweeting that she has been told from a reliable source Tate is leaving then tweeting again saying it was "unconfirmed" is childish and very unprofessional. That is why nobody takes Big Ten Network serious and people cringe when you have to watch your team play on their because the people that work their are a joke.

COB

August 19th, 2010 at 1:39 PM ^

I think you are unjustly freaking out.  Grammar not withstanding, I negged you for calling for a person's job for tweeting a rumor.   She is not paid to do investigative journalism.  She is paid to hold a microphone in player's faces.   If Tate isn't going to transfer then this incident means nothing.  Other than churning up the blogosphere, I'm pretty confident that no humans or animals were hurt in the tweeting of this rumor.  Has she been reprimanded, even given a "last chance", I don't know, probably but fired for it?  A lot of purported "real" journalists have done a lot worse and kept their jobs.