2014 World Cup Touted As Biggest Global Event For Social Media

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The 2014 World Cup’s popularity is so immense that it is touted as the “biggest global event for social media,” The Journal reported.

It beats the combined Super Bowl, Oscars and Winter Olympics social media attention, it added.

Based on the Facebook data, a total of 141 million users posted 459 million exchanges on Facebook on just the first week of World Cup.

Twitter on the other hand, reported a large number of tweets during the on-going World Cup. The June 12 Brazil’s win against Croatia in the opening game posted  12.2 million tweets,  eight million tweets during the U.S. game with Portugal, and 6.1 million tweets during Brazil against Cameroon.

Games will still be played in the World Cup until the middle of July, but the social media interactions so far, in the past days, are higher than the 2012 London Olympics social media interactions.

In the book entitled, The Comprehensive Guide to Careers in Sports, author Glenn Wong stated that in 2006, more than 30 million people watched the FIFA World Cup soccer competition in addition to 3.3 million spectators, making it the most watched sporting event in the world.

Sports viewing has fueled the digital access market, and because social media networks rely on the internet, more and more people are gaining access to the Web via phone and other mobile devices.

The latest statistics from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) stated that in 2014, there are 3 billion internet and mobile-cellular users, a one billion increase from the last World Cup in 2010.

Fans are using other platforms integrated into Facebook and Twitter to watch the event, interact and follow their favorite teams. One unique way of utilizing the social media is through the audio social networking.

London-based Audioboom Group PLC (BOOM.L) owner of Audioboo, digital social media platform, is becoming to be known as the YouTube and Twitter of the spoken word.  Audioboo is a free platform that enables the creation, broadcast and syndication of audio content across multiple global verticals, the company stated.

Audioboo is also being utilized by radio stations, journalists and podcasters in sharing their coverage and experiences of the World Cup.

The Audioboo platform allows fans, players, content partners to widen their reach globally through mobile apps, embeddable players and Facebook and Twitter sharing and generate revenues from ads.

According to the Audioboo Web site, several uploads and shared audio contents involving the excitement over the World Cup.

A World Cup fan from Ghana, Yussif Mukhtar shares his comments about his country’s soccer team through the BBC Africa audio feed, sport commentators shares daily podcast of World Cup Games on Audioboo and BBC’s Radio 4 interviews people in Brazil on their opinions about the soccer tournament.

Audioboo is a useful tool to record and listen to audio contents, it can be used  to record from a desktop, via the app on a smartphone or by uploading as an audio file.