Joe thought it was more than a little interesting recently when Stephen Holder of the St. Petersburg Times touted how he and his fellow scribe, the Mad Twitterer Rick Stroud, will keep fans up to date on Bucs minutia from training camp by using their blackberries to communicate via their individual Twitter accounts.

And when there’s news you need to know about, we’ll often alert you with our Tweets.

Joe applauds any way fans can be brought closer to the Bucs and better informed. And if using the newest electronic gadgets and hippest social media fads are the best way to connect with fans, all the better. 

(Post intermission: Joe wants to take this time to pimp his own Twitter account and his own Facebook account.)

But Holder’s boasting of his and Stroud’s use of Twitter reminds Joe of an issue he’s going to be totally serious about. Joe’s not trying to be a smartass here.

First off, Joe has absolutely nothing against Stroud. For all Joe knows Stroud is such a cool guy, he’s in line to succeed Pope Benedict some day. So let’s get that out of the way right now.

A few months ago, Stroud, on his Twitter account where he brags how he is an NFL beat writer  (even using “NFL” in his Twitter account’s username), posted he was “hearing reports the Bucs might be interested in Marvin Harrison.” This was picked up by not only Joe but also ProFootballTalk.com and even BSPN.

A few hours later, quite early on a Saturday morning, when the only sane people awake are fishermen, divers, runners, insomniacs and those returning home from late-night trysts, Stroud lashed out at those quoting him from his Twitter account, angrily informing all that not only was the Harrison item nothing more than empty talk, that he would never post real news on his Twitter account; rather, that’s what TampaBay.com is for.

Curiously, Stroud a few days later deleted the Harrison item from his account. How quaint?

So Joe has to ask in all seriousness: If Bucs fans are advised to monitor Stroud’s Twitter account during training camp, is there actually going to be Bucs news on Stroud’s account, or is Stroud using this as some weak attempt to copy Jackie Martling’s Jokeland.com? Or in Stroud’s own words, will the posts be nothing more than “agent-driven speculation?”

After all, Stroud himself stated that real news would be on TampaBay.com, not his Twitter account. Those are not Joe’s words; those are Stroud’s.

And Joe’s willing to bet the great media ethicist of our time, Eric Deggans, a colleague of Stroud’s, will not write about this on his blog (nor has he ever documented this incident; yet prominent national sports blogs have). But God forbid if Woody Cummings of the Tampa Tribune pulled a similar stunt. Deggans would be writing a 30-inch expose on this, chortling how no one from the Times would ever be so reckless.