After a little mixup this spring about whether or not the MLB would “bench” fans for using Periscope or Meerkat at the stadiums, the league announced this week that it will distribute official content via Snapchat on a weekly basis. Via “Our Stories,” the MLB will curate content from fans into an official “broadcasts” of a sort every Wednesday and Thursday.
Ben Schwerin, director of partnerships at Snapchat, says in the original Wall Street Journal report that, “We live in a world now where tens of thousands of fans have a phone and a camera, and they’re sharing moments they care about.”
From the report:
The goal is to capture the experience of attending a baseball game, according to MLB Advanced Media’s Senior Director of New Media, Andrew Patterson. That could mean stitching together content featuring action on the field with video depicting fans’ experiences in the stands. It may also include behind-the-scenes footage submitted by MLB’s own social media correspondents who are at every game.
Capture, or control, the experience of sharing stadium moments. Either way, co-opting the social experience is better than rumors that you want to by stingy with your games.