When the New York Giants take on the New England Patriots on September first they will be offering a new social media feature to fans, the ability to have their voices heard or rather read during the game.
The Giants and NBC 4 in New York will periodically post Tweets from fans during the game. Tweets will appear on the lower third of the screen during big plays and will run for the final two preseason games. During the regular season the Giants also have plans to show the tweets throughout MetLife Stadium including on their video boards, creating a new form of player/fan integration.
Along with simply tweeting about plays, users will also be able to use hashtags during the game to vote for their favorite player, those hashtags will be curated by social media firm Mass Relevance and the results will be shown in real-time and featured on a dedicated microsite, fans can then buy that winning players merchandise for discounted rates for an entire week via the Giants online store.
Further integrating Twitter into their digital landscape one player will be available during home games to chat via Twitter.
The move is a drastic departure from the NFL’s attempt to limit player Twitter usage, in 2009 the league banned in-game tweeting.
Will you be taking part in the new Twitter setup offered by the New York Giants?