No other sporting event conjures up as much global excitement and sense of nationalism as the FIFA World Cup. Easily the largest sporting event in the world, the 2010 World Cup in South Africa will begin in less than 1 month (June 11 – July 11).
How big is the World Cup event?
Try 715. An astounding 715.1 million people watched the final match of the 2006 World Cup in Germany between Italy and France (Wikipedia). This year’s event is expected to be even bigger than the 2006 games due to the explosion of social media outlets.
Youtube was around in 2006, but their videos were “blocky” and contents were not as comprehensive as today. Facebook was not opened to the general public until September of 2006 and Twitter did not fully launch until July 2006. This suggests that the 2006 world cup did not reap the full benefits of the current social media fad of 2010. (Onlineprnews)
Social media activity may reach an all-time high in the near month and in return, world cup exposure may reach an unprecedented level. The world will become extremely connected as people share their thoughts and reflections on the day-to-day events and scores.
Robin Sloan, a media partnership specialist at Twitter commented, “Our notion is that [the World Cup] will eclipse everything we have seen so far [on Twitter] including the U.S. election, the Oscars or the Super Bowl, simply because it is so international.” (CNN)
Big businesses have been preparing for awhile now to capitalize on the heavy web traffic this coming month. For example, Visa (FIFA partner) introduced the FIFA WorldCup Match Planner, “a social media application that allows users to create customizable, dynamic FIFA World CupTM viewing schedules to share with friends via social networking channels such as Facebook”. Other businesses have set up similar marketing strategies. (Webwire)
How to prepare for the festivities?
The largest sports event in the world calls for the largest party/celebration in the world. How does one prepare for the festivities?
1) The largest amount of food
2) The largest TV
Superbowl (American football) fans know that the all-important day must be accompanied by platters of finger food. The selection of food, of course, varies by country so use your imagination as we will not delve into this topic today.
The size of the game must be matched by the size of the TV. You guessed it! Bigger is, indeed, better. VnMedia reports that high tech TV customers have increased since early 2010, and that sales of LCD and Plasma TVs (the top choice for many customers) will likely increase 10-20% due to this year’s World Cup event. The most popular TV sets are the 36 inch ones which price at around 6-8 million dong.
The obligatory shout-out to Vietnam’s football team
In the end, the most important aspect of the game is to cheer on one’s favorite team. The 2010 World Cup qualifications process began in August of 2007 and involved 204 out of 208 FIFA national teams. The teams are organized into groups with the victors in each group earning qualification to proceed to the world’s stage in South Africa.
At Vietnam Talking Points, we are obviously biased (the name of our blog says it all). Though Vietnam did not qualify this year, we hope to make a presence on the world’s stage in the future. Vietnam is currently 118th on the FIFA World Ranking.
Either way, Vietnamese people are hardcore football fanatics and I am sure everyone will be following their favorite teams.
Which football team will you be cheering for?
What finger foods do Vietnamese people eat for game day?
How will the tech savvy youths in Vietnam respond to football mania?
go USA! …. and Brazil!
Good composition. You must have a very good and deep understanding of love of Vietnamese people for football, the top sport in the world. I have read the whole of your composition and have been so impressed by your way of narrating, very interesting. Thank you Brian !
Go Thuy Si!!! I wish the Swiss win the world cup! Wish is a good start already!
…And I am more than looking forward to see Vietnam being on the playground soon!