The first few weeks of Facebook’s exclusive MLB package have been rocky, to say the least. Between clunky graphics, glitches and poor viewership, there’s room for improvement in all facets.
But maybe the most frustrating aspect of the Facebook MLB experience, from a viewer’s perspective, has been the streaming comment section. Watching games on the platform has meant enduring an endless flow of angry fans, trolls, people saying provocative things about politics and, during Thursday’s Diamondbacks-Phillies game, porn bots.
As chronicled by Zach Buchanan of The Athletic, the stream Thursday featured an alarming number of comments from, among other suspicious accounts, a user named Jessica Cox who was quite fond of the 💦 emoji. Via The Athletic:
“Join me dear, I’m live,” wrote an account under the name of Jessica Cox with a profile photo of a naked woman. Another account beckoned viewers to “See how I play Didlo [sic]” while a third encouraged viewers to “Treat yo self with a hot and seductive exclusive show.” Several of the accounts posted multiple times at different points in the game, and some viewers began jokingly interacting with them. Many of the spam accounts punctuated their comments with suggestive emojis.
— Zach Buchanan (@ZHBuchanan) April 26, 2018
If the presence of porn bots on your baseball broadcast is disturbing to you, have no fear. Major League Baseball and Facebook are aware of the problem, and they’re on it.
“This is a concern and we are working with Facebook to ensure the proper safeguards are in place,” an MLB spokesperson said in an emailed statement to The Athletic. A Facebook spokesperson relayed similar concern when reached by email:
“There is no place for activity such as this during these MLB broadcasts. These comments were posted by inauthentic accounts, which are not allowed on our platform. We have deleted these accounts and are working to prevent this type of abuse from occurring again.”
This sounds like an anti-porn crusade Dayton Moore would be proud of.
The blame for Facebook’s porn-bot invasion probably falls with whoever decided it was a good idea to have a running stream of comments on these games. Because when you ask random people to weigh in on anything online, it’s almost inevitable that you wind up with insults, anger, uninformed opinions and porn.
About Alex Putterman
Alex is a writer and editor for The Comeback and Awful Announcing. He has written for The Atlantic, VICE Sports, MLB.com, SI.com and more. He is a proud alum of Northwestern University and The Daily Northwestern. You can find him on Twitter @AlexPutterman.