ESPN Public Editor Jim Brady in his latest filing addresses the company's revised social media policy, noting the changes "aren’t wildly different from the previous set, but the main change is the addition of a preamble that ties the policies to ESPN’s larger mission, something the previous policies did not." ESPN President John Skipper said that the changes were "not made specifically in response" to the Jemele Hill incident, but "more because of what those controversies reflected." Skipper said of the revisions, "It’s prompted by the moment that we are having right now, and the political time and the polarization." Skipper added that the guidelines -- first issued by ESPN in '11, with slight revisions in '12 -- were "created under very different circumstances." At that time, the main concerns were "about how ESPN handled breaking news and interactions with consumers and colleagues on social media, rather than the political context of posts." Now, the political and societal issue elements are an "unavoidable part of any social media platform, which has created challenges for ESPN." Skipper: "We wanted this to be more of a call to action and to sound like a human being actually wrote it.” Brady noted the new guidelines are "important to ESPN as an entity, not just to each individual." One option for ESPN was to "opt for a long, imposing, very specific set of guidelines that would likely have been impossible to police, and could have prompted ESPN staffers to decide social media wasn’t worth the effort." Skipper said, "We really do trust people, and we want the standard to be: Be smart” (ESPN.com, 11/2).
