After the recent bout of football players getting into trouble with their comments on social networks, primarily Twitter, in recent months. The Football Association has come out in the hope to clarify their position on its use going forward.

Players have been warned that they will crack down on improper comments on Twitter and other social networking sites.

Before leaving for Hamburg in January, Ryan Babel became the first player to be sanctioned for comments made on Twitter when he was fined £10,000 for posting a mocked-up picture of referee Howard Webb wearing a Manchester United shirt.

Arsenal’s Jack Wilshere last week escaped action after complaining of “inconsistent refereeing” on his Twitter account, and the FA have moved to clarify their position.

The FA statement read: “The FA has issued clarification to participants relating to the use of social networking sites, including, but not limited to Twitter, Facebook and internet blogs.

“Participants should be aware that comments made on such sites may be considered public comment, and that further to FA Rule E3, any comments which are deemed improper, bring the game into disrepute, or are threatening, abusive, indecent or insulting may lead to disciplinary action.

“Comments which are personal in nature or could be construed as offensive, use foul language or contain direct or indirect threats aimed at other participants are likely to be considered improper.”

Players have also been warned that even though they believe their postings are only visible to a limited number of selected people they may still end up in the public domain.

“Consequently, care should be exercised with regards to the contents of such postings,” says the statement.

“In addition, we would remind participants that social networking postings could also lead to civil proceedings being brought by affected parties.”

This comes on the heels of the PPC ruling that Twitter comments are to seen as being in the public domain and therefore perfectly liable for reproduction in newspapers and magazines. The case was in regards to the Daily Mail and Independent on Sunday reporting tweets by civil servant Sarah Baskerville (@baskers).

A summary of the finding said that: In reaching its decision on the case, the Commission judged that the publicly accessible nature of the information was a “key consideration”. It was quite clear that the potential audience for the information was actually much larger than the 700 people who followed the complainant directly, not least because any message could easily be retweeted to a wider audience.

It also took into account the type of information that had been published by the newspapers, which in this case related directly to the complainant’s professional life as a public servant. In all the circumstances, the Commission concluded that the newspapers’ actions did not constitute “an unjustifiable intrusion” into the complainant’s privacy.

In the United States, the NFL’s Twitter policy stipulates that “players must not tweet 90 minutes before kick-off and until they have met post-match media obligations”.

Players breaking that rule are automatically fined $25,000 (£15,750), though the FA argues that a Twitter policy should come from the Premier League.

The NBA also stipulates that mobile phones and other communication devices cannot be used from 45 minutes prior to a match and until after the players have finished their post-match responsibilities to traditional media outlets.

Do you think these rules should be introduced in football and/or other sports? How do you see this developing?