Tag Archives: retweet

Contest Post-Tweeting: How People Don’t Read Contest Info



iPad
iPad

Next week I’ll be headed to San Francisco for TechCrunch Disrupt San Francisco. Naturally, I added the hashtag #tcdisrupt in my Tweet deck. I went through the posts, and one seems to keep coming up:

TechCrunch Giveaway: White iPad 2 and Nook Color #TCDisrupt {link removed} via @techcrunch

I went to the page in question and they gave away a White iPad2. Yes, I said GAVE AWAY. This was for TechCrunch Disrupt in New York that happened back in June.

This is not the first time I’ve seen this tweet reaction. Someone sees a post saying “Win this, retweet and your entered”. You do so, but you don’t see the link they post. Now you’ve just entered into a contest that has been over for months.

I have held contests from time-to-time. I remember one where I was trying to increase my followers and said to Twitter the link information and hashtag. Weeks after the contest, I was still getting tweets. I even remember one guy who tweeted me “Did you draw a winner yet?” I had to reply “Yes, but that was back in April.”

This seems to be an interesting way to build people, but also is a bit deceptive. Of course, if people don’t read the rules, it’s not your fault, right?

In this case, I would say “wrong”. Why? Because TechCrunch hasn’t updated the page to say in the first line “CONTEST OVER”. Even in the title, they should put that information.

In the meantime, people are thinking they’ve just entered a contest for a white iPad2.Too bad they didn’t win…


Want to see an Internet Oxymoron?



Check out this screenshot. Tell me why it’s an Oxymoron:

The Internet Oxymoron

If you said “This is an Associated Press article – I CANNOT share it on Mixx, Buzz, Digg, Reddit, Facebook or Newswire”, then you are correct!

If you go to the A.P.s site, you do not see any sharing widgets. However, if you go to the sites that pay for the content, they could have these little add-ons to try and promote their brand. But with these widgets, they could be in breech of their contract.

The Associated Press has said it doesn’t want to squelch new media, but it will go after sites that post it’s content and make money on it. Isn’t that like EVERY site on the Internet?

Back in June, the AP told their reporters to police social media like Facebook and Twitter. The idea would be to identify and irradicate any posts that violate their usage policies. So you could get a take down notice if you post  or “Re Tweet” those A.P. articles.

If you have a website and you have A.P. content on it, you might want to think about those little blurbs to suggest sharing the articles. You may be inadvertently breaching your contract.

I wonder if someone should start a list of Websites that use A.P. so we all know not to share the data from it. Of course, I am not going to rock that boat. However, if you know of a website that is an Associated Press site, you might want to comment on it below…