General

ESPN’s Interactive Tuesday Makes You Dumber

Nov 12, 2008, 3:45 PM UTC

This idea has been tried before: the interactive live chat scrolling on television. MTV tried it back in the late ‘90s with mixed results; they edited comments for profanity, but during a broadcast of the video for Shabba Ranks’ “Mr Loverman,“ the exchange turned on the video quickly. It went something like this:â†µâ†µUSER1: Mr. Loverman. SHABBA! Ths song sux.â†µ

â†µâ†µUSER2: He doesn’t do anything! Mr. Lazymanâ†µ

â†µâ†µUSER3: More like Mr. UGLYMAN!â†µ

â†µâ†µUSER1: LOL YES! MR. UGLYMAN!â†µ

â†µâ†µUSER2: SHABBA!!!â†µ

â†µâ†µMTV then discontinued this feature shortly afterward, as they should have. ESPN’s “Interactive Tuesday” will eventually meet the same fate, but for different reasons. The comments from users stream across the top of the screen, and the quality of the comments comes straight from the ESPN.com school of commentary: bland, meaningless, and at their worst mind-blowingly dumb. Example: â†µ

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â†µâ†µYes, because the only thing that would make a Tuesday night MAC showdown better for me as a sports fan is giving ChargerBoi3 the chance to belch out an inane opinion layered distractingly over the action. Isn’t letting Emmitt Smith talk on television bad enough for ESPN? At least Emmitt Smith provides an element of comedy; Interactive Tuesday’s bland patter just makes me sad. At the very least, let the crowd turn on the announcers, since as unplanned as it was, I still giggle when I think of Mr. Uglyman. The opportunity to let something interesting happen on air, though, doesn’t exactly scream “part of ESPN’s Mission statement.”â†µ

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This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.

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