Digital Sport’s Weekly Wash-Up

October 28, 2016 Toby Marriott

Kings own the Suns

This week we had a late candidate for tweet of the year. NBA side Phoenix Suns were pretty excited about the start of the new season and their first match against The Sacramento Kings, so they posted an iPhone home screen where it looks like Devin Booker is holding the most recent message.

???? pic.twitter.com/xLVvzdesPh

— Phoenix Suns (@Suns) October 19, 2016

After beating the Suns 113-94 on the opening day of the season, The Kings responded.

.@Suns ???? pic.twitter.com/uBCJjgG3ck

— Sacramento Kings (@SacramentoKings) October 27, 2016

Ruthless.

Vine is dead. Long live Vine.

If you’re a follower of sports online, you know how important Vine is. From County Championship cricket to the NFL, it has been everyone’s go-to platform for sharing sports highlights. It revolutionised short-form video, it was easy to operate and even easier to distribute on Twitter. But yesterday, the long running rumour of the platform’s death was formally announced.

Of course, the death of Vine is not the end of the world for content creators in sport. We can still post our favourite sports highlights on Twitter Video, Facebook and Instagram directly from mobile. But it’s just not the same without Vine. As one writer brilliantly put it: “Watching a video on Vine is like riding a really short carousel; you can’t rewind the ride, but you’re OK with that because the moment you missed will return again. And again. And again, until you decide to stop the ride.”

Sony recruit Leroy Sané to promote Xperia brand

Manchester City’s Leroy Sané has become the latest footballer to sign an advertising deal with Sony. As part of the deal, the German winger will appear in a television ad campaign for Sony’s Xperia XZ and Xperia Z X Compact mobile phones.

Through VR, wearable tech and fresh online content, Man City is leading the way in technology as part of its efforts to drive innovation across sponsorships and strengthen its global fanbase. The partnership makes perfect sense.

Twitter done right.

And finally: if you run an official team account on social media you are bombarded with thousands of messages daily, either praising the players or lamenting their poor performances. Sometimes, you simply have to remind fans of reality.