Twitter suspends sports blog accounts over NFL GIFs, Vines

Twitter suspended accounts belonging to Gawker Media's sport site Deadspin and Vox Media's SB Nation, Monday night after the NFL filed complaints related to their posting of GIFs and Vine videos of copyrighted highlights.

The complaint alleged that some Tweets, which included GIFs and Vines, were in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, reports CNN. 

Other professional sports franchises are reported to have filed along with the NFL, including the Big 12 and Southeastern collegiate sports conferences as well as the Ultimate Fighting Championship, reports NBC.

The NFL told reporters it requested Twitter disable tweets featuring copyrighted material, though not the accounts themselves. 

The @Deadspin account was suspended for about an hour yesterday. The @SBNationGIF account remains suspended as of Tuesday afternoon. 

Both Deadspin and SB Nation regularly post GIFs and Vines of sports highlights.

Gawker's social media strategist tweeted how many requests had been made before its account was disabled.  

During the shutdown, Deadspin requested readers visit its Facebook page, while ESPN host Keith Olbermann temporarily tweeted on behalf of Deadspin.

Use of files such as GIFs and Vines are commonplace by both digital media organizations and other social media users, though they are often generated using copyrighted material. 

Despite the grey area, the NFL's sabre-rattling probably isn't going to go over well on the internet.