A few years ago I was an avid listener of Colin Cowherd’s radio program. Like him or not, he had a pretty wise take on Twitter. He believed that Twitter was a loaded gun, meaning you could hand it to someone and they would be likely to shoot themselves (or someone else). I think he was on to something.
I tried Twitter before it really hit the mainstream. I wasn’t an original user, but I was probably in before you were. My company at the time was looking for exposure and all of the marketing people I spoke with told me I had to get on Twitter. I had both a company account and a personal one. I did not last long. At the time I was a user the LPGA was just starting their campaign on Twitter as well. I followed Christina Kim and Michelle Wie, among others, and the nasty comments made to them by random people went beyond the definition of mean. I didn’t know if I was supposed to be offended or, as a parent, concerned that someone might be stalking them. I quickly left Twitter.
Colin’s main point regarding Twitter was that the filter is removed. People can say things they think in their head that they would never say in person. Just type it into that little bubbly prompt and hit “Send.” Ninety plus percent of tweets go without a follow up. But the five or ten percent can be dangerous and damaging.
Just ask Ted Bishop.
Is it just me, or is Ian Poulter becoming the Colin Montgomerie of the twenty-teens? Unlike Monty, Poults plays the PGA TOUR more at this part of his career than he does the European Tour, but his two PGA TOUR wins pale compared with his 13 in Europe. Like Monty, he seems to be a lightning rod for American (at least) ire. While not entirely his fault, he does manage to fan the flames from time to time: “…I know I haven’t played to my full potential and when that happens, it will be just me and Tiger.” Suffice it to say, controversy seems to swirl around his heavily-producted hair. His latest is a spat with the president of the PGA. Be nice to Ian? Nah. What fun would that be?
While some golf companies go the route of bombarding the customer with release after release, Titleist takes the opposite approach and sticks to a two year product cycle with woods and irons alternating years. While that means that there is often a product from a competitor with more current technology, it gives Titleist the opportunity to do its due diligence and figure out what technologies work, which don’t and then bring debut a lineup that will hold its own for a couple years. It wasn’t until the 910 line of clubs that Titleist added an adjustable hosel, which was quite a while after competitors such as TaylorMade and Callaway had done so; however, Titleist took the time to do it right and the hosel they created is regarded by many to be the best of the bunch; an opinion which is further supported by the fact that four years later the company is still using the same one and is no essentially being used by Callaway (just a minor tweak to their version).