Following the World Series has come a long way from crowding around a transistor radio or TV set.
Personal technology in the age of social media has enabled people stuck at work or living overseas to get up-to-the-second news — often without a TV or radio.
Many faithful followers of the San Francisco Giants and Texas Rangers intend to get their fill of the 106th fall classic through Facebook groups, tweets and text messages. The best-of-seven series starts [Wednesday].
Major League Baseball’s MLB.com app, available on iPhone, iPad, Android and BlackBerry devices, is being opened 1.9 million times a day. “Baseball is well suited to constant updates for every pitch, and the smartphone is the ideal vehicle to view live entertainment,” says Bob Bowman, CEO of MLB.com.
Bowman says approximately 12 million people are either fans of MLB or one of its 30 teams on Facebook — triple what it was a year ago. Three million people have signed up to follow baseball-related tweets via MLB and its teams.
Long-suffering Giants fans, desperate for the team’s first championship since 1954, are convening on Facebook groups to share pitch-by-pitch analysis. Many consider the groups therapeutic, given the team’s knack for winning excruciating, one-run games. “I guess it’s a useful way to let off steam,” says Bob Byrne, 63, one of 64 members of “Giants Baseball 2010: Torture.”
Rangers fans, who are used to their share of playoff misery — the team has not won a championship in its 49-year existence — are tweeting and texting like mad to celebrate the team’s first trip to the World Series. Robyn Risenhoover, 23, sent text messages, photos and video from her iPhone during the Rangers’ pennant-clinching win Friday over the New York Yankees.
Lifetime fan Maranda Gibson, 27, a social-media specialist at a telecom company in Fort Worth, doesn’t watch games…