It was a throw-away line at the end of another sappy Rick Reilly column.

And in a what-should-I-Twitter-about-myself-now? world, why would a young guy be so selfless? "Well, I know what it's like when your parents divorce. It can be hard. Moving. Splitting up from their dad. I wanted to make sure nothing happened to the kids."

But it really got me thinking about Twitter and how I plan to use it. Is tweeting all just self-promotion?

Well, you can be cyncial and site the recent exchanges between Shaquille O'Neal and Mark Cuban that have led to rampart speculation the Mavs will sign or trade for the aging superstar in the off-season as pure narcissism.

Or, and I'll admit here's the part that took some research, you can pull up the Huffington Post's list of the "Best Green Twitter Feeds" as an example of people letting their fingers do the walkign to give back. I'm sure there are lots of others.

But in the end, I think you have to recognize Twitter for what it is. It's a tool - nothing more, nothing less. If you don't want Twitter to be about ego-inflation, then stop making such a big deal of the celebrities who tweet. Add a Tweetfeed of your own that inspires people to do good.

That's what I hope to do. It's hard to let my account die after my class is over, especially now that I have more than 150 followers. A couple of them aren't even students in the class. They are friends and co-workers and even a couple people I respect in the industry.

While my reasons for keeping the account may be self-serving, the ways in which I use it don't have to be.

I fondly remember rushing home from school to watch cartoons. I even got in trouble for cutting through my neighbor's horse pasture so I wouldn't miss the first half of RoboTech (Sorry Bro. Oswalt, may you rest in peace.) But those days are over if you don't have cable, and I feel bad my kids can't experience them.

Well, I've found just about the next best thing. CW4Kids.tv offers a full catalog of almost all of its shows, including Ninja Turtles, Sonic X, and Yu-Gi-Oh! (I'm embarrassed to know all those). But what's more is the site doesn't just stop there, and that's why its worthy of an entry on my "work blog." CW4Kids is doing what all networks that decide to offer shows online should do. They are using the full potential of the Internet to motivate and sustain fans.

No, I'm not just talking about the blatant advertising - and somewhat addictive - of special codes during their Saturday morning cartoons. Yes, I did a Google search for Huntik amulet codes the other day. It was fun seeing what they'd unlock.

What I'm really talking about are all the other ideas the site offers, even the decidedly low-tech ones. Specifically, today we downloaded and printed a bunch of the Papercraft characters to help the kids pass the time during conference, and while they were much too complicated for our six and three year olds, they were absorbing enough to capture the attention of me and my wife.

The three characters you see in the above photo are what we finished. OK, I just cut them out; my wife as the main builder. I blamed my big fingers, but really I just didn't want to. I think we did OK. Sonic, the first one we did was the best. Fergy from VivaPinata was easy. The tapes' only there to keep him together because Holly got a little overzealous with him. I'm not sure what happened with Knuckles, but we just couldn't keep his arms on.

Look, it's a pretty simple thing, and maybe it's a natural for a kids' site to do, although I think CW4Kids is better than PBSkids.org, which is a bear to navigate and requires Internet Explorer to work right. But it shows at least someone there is thinking about the audience and about how to make the Web work for them. That's a lesson I'm trying to teach my students because I think it's something the industry hasn't quite learned yet.

A real blog entry is on the way soon, but I had to post this in the meantime. Mark Cuban, a guy I said should be the NBA's example on how to create publicity through blogging, was just fined $25,000 for comments he posted on his Twitter feed about the calls refs made during the Mavericks 103-101 loss to the Nuggets.

One of his tweets is an instant classic in my mind (from the Fox Sports story referenced above):

"can't say no one makes money from twitter now. the nba does."

So if that doesn't convince you that there's something to this Twitter thing David Stern, I don't know what else will.

Also I have to note I just saw an interview with Gilbert Arenas after his return to the NBA where he swore off blogging. Here's what he told the AP:

"It's just like the double-(edged) sword thing: Eventually your words is going to kill you," and "it's like everything I said, everybody started using it as firepower, instead of saying it's just entertainment."

If my blog was getting that kind of traction, the last thing I'd do is give it up, but then again, I haven't signed an $111 million contract YET!

Just read this on ESPN and had to share because I think it validates my previous post. I especially appreciated this paragraph:

Though Villanueva promised not to tweet again during a game, he did question whether there's much difference between a player taking a few seconds to do a television interview at halftime and taking a few seconds to use their mobile phone to post a Web message to fans.

So there you have it. Tweet away you crazy NBA players, and make sure you follow the women's professional soccer league feeds. Who wouldn't mind getting a text from Mia Hamm every once in a while.

When I first saw this headline on ESPN.com, I thought, "Not again." I thought the NBA, or at least the Milwaukee Bucks, were following the NCAA's lead in banning reporters from liveblogging games. I wondered how the NBA could misunderstand the ways people use Twitter so much that it would ignore the marketing potential following a game on your cell phone has.

But then I actually read the story, and now I'm not so sure. I still think Twitter could be a valuable tool for a large sports league like the NBA. I think it needs to give its players more freedom to create fan opportunities online. But maybe players should focus more on the coach's halftime speech and less on updating their feeds.

I guess I've gotten ahead of myself, as I often do. The story, if you haven't already read it, describes how Charlie Villaneuva, a Milwaukee forward, sent the following tweet or twitt, as he calls it (Is that right? It sounds dirty.) during halftime of the Bucks game against the Boston Celtics:

"In da locker room, snuck to post my twitt. We're playing the Celtics, tie ball game at da half. Coach wants more toughness. I gotta step up."

I guess he did step up. I couldn't find out how many points he scored after halftime, but he led his team with 19-points in the 86-77 win.

If I were the coach, I would want my player focused on the game, not his cell phone, so I can understand Scott Skiles' decision to ban Twitter from the locker room. But I also think he and his team are overestimating how hard it is to send a quick tweet. I can't imagine it takes any longer than the inane halftime interviews coaches or players grant to the sideline reporter. I think it's a lot less distracting than being " mic'ed up " or followed constantly with a courtside camera. I mean during last Sunday's NHL on NBC game, I could watch Sean Avery's every move online. So what's wrong with a little tweeting?

I think the real issue is not distraction. It's control. The league wants to dictate how and when its players promote themselves. But the league look at Gilbert Arena's or Mark Cuban's blogs to understand how individual players or owners acting alone can drum up more publicity than their well crafted technological angles.

I'm all for imposing, as we say in the business, "content neutral" rules on Twitter. Players could, for example, limit their tweets to the first five minutes after the half is over. But if you are going to give the media unprecedented access to players through mics and cameras, then you have to give players the same rights. The NBA might be surprised at what happens.

P.S. On a side note that's related and probably should have been the focus of this post, the Utah Jazz have been innovatively using the Web to connect with fans for the last two years. Jazzbots is a collection of fan blogs, sponsored and maintained by the team. From what I can tell, the blogs are the honest opinions of fans, not sanitized to protect players or coaches. I've really enjoyed what I've read, especially the posts from a fiery writer named Mallory Meyer . Ok, she's my niece, but she does a great job and the spirit of what she's doing meshes well with my research interests. I smell a conference paper!