Rio Ferdinand says he "didn't see the point" in appealing to the Football Association over his three-match suspension and 25,000 pound fine for sending an offensive tweet.
The FA admitted former Manchester United centre-back Ferdinand's position as a "role model" was taken into account, as well as his apparent lack of remorse, when they handed out the sanction.
"I didn't see the point [in appealing]. The rate of success on appeals on these type of disciplinary panels is almost zero," Ferdinand told The Sun at the Web Summit conference in Dublin. "It would just prolong the affair, so I'm nipping it in the bud."
The FA also said Ferdinand "should know better" given his previous history on the site after sending an offensive tweet referring to Ashley Cole in 2012.
Ferdinand, who has six million followers of Twitter, says he won't be closing his account over the incident.
"The main reason for me going on Twitter, on social media, was to engage with fans," Ferdinand added. "As a kid I wanted to be closer to the players, I wanted to know what they ate, how they travelled, where they went, what they wore and everything.
"People have a perception of who you are. Now when I speak to people on the street, they say to me: 'You're a different type of person.'
"The ability to speak and interact all the time and engage with people shows a 'realer' side of you and they get to understand you. It can be a hard place to be at times, if you're losing and not playing well.
"That's when the venom starts coming out. If you're impulsive, don't go on there. You've got to control yourself."
When asked what he had learned from the incident, Ferdinand said: "You've got to pick you're moments."
He added: "The problem is that sometimes you're at home, you've lost a game, you're sitting there and you're looking through your Twitter feed and you're really frustrated.
"You've lost the game, you've played rubbish, you're not doing well, you're not where you want to be in the league, and you just see a few tweets that come in and just think, 'Ah, that's funny, that one's funny, he's giving me a bit of stick, that one's funny, he's giving me stick, he's coming back on again!'
"I just think, 'I'm going to shut him down.' Invariably I get it right, I hit it on the nail and I shut him down and he gets retweeted and he has to open a new account because he gets destroyed, but this time I was deemed to have gone over the line, and we are where we are now."