NTRA & Gulfstream Park: Social Media Juxtaposition

This morning we got a nice contrast on what racing should be doing, and what it shouldn't, when it comes to social media.

Penelope Miller, the new NTRA social media person, was interviewed today and had some good social media answers.  

She spoke of how tracks should get involved to promote, engage and give out fun and worthwhile information via the web.

Conversely, in my twitter feed this morning, I saw this line from a horseplayer tweeted to Gulfstream Park:

• "I don't follow you for slots results"

Investigating, I see that Gulfstream Park - one of the highest handle tracks in the nation - uses their twitter feed for this:

 and this::

I have no problem with a track promoting their casino side, but when the track uses the main twitter feed for slot machine news?

Slot revenue will not save us, and it appears there is no one in charge, or someone with a will, to use this revenue for something to grow the demand side of the game (sorry to sound like a broken record on that).

That being said, I don't think it's too much to ask for a racetrack twitter feed to be about the racetrack.

Note: The headline news marches on. In Pennsylvania the government is again looking to raid slot-purses for general revenues.

Sometimes We're Left Speechless

Although it is very difficult to do, sometimes headlines render me close to speechless.

Someone at a meeting this past few months in Jersey said "wouldn't it be a good idea to bring back the diving horse?". And someone said "Ya, great idea".

• As part of a revitalization effort in Atlantic City, New Jersey, the owners of the city’s historic Steel Pier have announced that they will bring back the horse diving show by Memorial Day of this year.

• In the diving horse show, a horse jumps off of a tower that is approximately 40 feet high. In some versions of the act, a rider climbs on to the horse at the top of the tower and rides the horse as it plummets into the 12-foot pool below. In other versions of the act, the horse dives solo.

What, were there no little people available for a midget toss?

I doubt this idea ever gets off the ground, no pun intended. It's so glaringly bad and offensive, someone, somewhere with the IQ above a bowl of breakfast cereal will stop it.

Related- The movie industry stopped throwing horses into pools of water in 1939. 

Someday We'll Look Back & Cringe

For horse lovers, the recent headline in the Toronto Star about a bistro bringing horsemeat back to the menu, was cringeworthy.

Sometimes things make no sense. In America where "all men are created equal", there was slavery and separate water fountains. Women, apparently because being born with a different chromosome made them unable to walk to a polling station, could not vote in our country. When we look back at it, it's embarrassing that any sane person could've thought that way.

Horses are much more than just domesticated animals. They've helped us settle our respective nations. They fought side by side with us in wars against oppression. They were a means of transport when we had none. They delivered mail, worked fields so we could eat, and became our friends. They are not, nor have they ever been considered a non-domesticated food source like a cow or pig.

• Who knows what the world would be like today were it not for the existence and domestication of the horse? Our partner for centuries, perhaps no other animal has served man in so many diverse ways, nor suffered so dearly for it.

Eating our friends in a civilized country like ours, who have given us and World History so much, and asked for so little? They should be on a postage stamp, not a dinner plate.

One day, I'm convinced, we'll look back and cringe.