Taken by jdebner on Flickr.
Superbowl XLIII took place last night. If you have the slighest interest in American football (or if you are indeed American) you’ll know that already. I hold a bit of an interest. Not enough to watch the whole season prior to the event, but enough to sit down and pay attention for one night a year.
I eventually opted to listen to the commentary on BBC Radio 5 Live, while lying in bed. What I like about 5 Live is that they are fully aware that a lot of the people listening will be regular listeners who may not fully ‘get’ American football, but hold a bit of an interest (I was pretty much target audience then). They explain it in layman’s terms (again, I was target audience).
The best bit… next door were having some sort of Superbowl party, with a few folk round for drinks and watching it on the telly. Radio audio is always slightly ahead of telly audio, so I got to hear what was happening in the Superbowl, and then get their boisterious reactions 5 seconds later.
What was also fun was listening in my ears while watching the continuous stream of comments regarding the Superbowl on Twitter.
I’ve spoken about Twitter before. It’s a what’s called a “microblogging” service. You have 140 characters to say whatever you want, and your ‘followers’ then get to read what you are saying (or tweeting as it is known). Its popularity over the last month or two has risen consisderably after the media have picked up on Twitter’s famous users such as Stephen Fry and Barack Obama. I’ve had an account with Twitter for year and a bit now. At first I thought it was a bit daft, who’d want to read what other people were eating for lunch? But over the last month or so I have really begun to understand its potential.
I understood it as soon as I had discovered the Twitter search facility. As the name may suggest, it allows you to search Tweets based on certain rules. You could search for all the Tweets coming out of Aberdeen. You can also search by subject, like what I was doing last night, searching bythe subject ‘Superbowl‘.
So now not only was I listening to the Superbowl and hearing the thoughts of the commentators, I was also listening to the Superbowl and getting instant reaction on the game from thousands of people around the globe. Every touch down and fumble of the game, somebody had something to say. The Twitterverse were massive fans of the half time show with Bruce Springsteen, me included!
What was also fascinating to watch was the continous stream of tweets about the snow which is hitting the UK at the moment. People in London commenting on the status of their street, how Boris had cancelled all the buses and the tweets as people slowly realised they weren’t going to make it to work. Despite being 1,000 miles away in a snowless Aberdeen, I almost felt I was a part of it.
I know next time something, god forbid, major happens I’ll be logging on to Twitter so get a better understanding of what’s going on.
It even lets me know what minor celebrity Richard Bacon had for lunch, a vegetable biryani if you’re interested.
David (or @drl if you have Twitter)
The Superbowl, 5 Live and Twitter
February 2, 2009Taken by jdebner on Flickr.
Superbowl XLIII took place last night. If you have the slighest interest in American football (or if you are indeed American) you’ll know that already. I hold a bit of an interest. Not enough to watch the whole season prior to the event, but enough to sit down and pay attention for one night a year.
I eventually opted to listen to the commentary on BBC Radio 5 Live, while lying in bed. What I like about 5 Live is that they are fully aware that a lot of the people listening will be regular listeners who may not fully ‘get’ American football, but hold a bit of an interest (I was pretty much target audience then). They explain it in layman’s terms (again, I was target audience).
The best bit… next door were having some sort of Superbowl party, with a few folk round for drinks and watching it on the telly. Radio audio is always slightly ahead of telly audio, so I got to hear what was happening in the Superbowl, and then get their boisterious reactions 5 seconds later.
What was also fun was listening in my ears while watching the continuous stream of comments regarding the Superbowl on Twitter.
I’ve spoken about Twitter before. It’s a what’s called a “microblogging” service. You have 140 characters to say whatever you want, and your ‘followers’ then get to read what you are saying (or tweeting as it is known). Its popularity over the last month or two has risen consisderably after the media have picked up on Twitter’s famous users such as Stephen Fry and Barack Obama. I’ve had an account with Twitter for year and a bit now. At first I thought it was a bit daft, who’d want to read what other people were eating for lunch? But over the last month or so I have really begun to understand its potential.
I understood it as soon as I had discovered the Twitter search facility. As the name may suggest, it allows you to search Tweets based on certain rules. You could search for all the Tweets coming out of Aberdeen. You can also search by subject, like what I was doing last night, searching bythe subject ‘Superbowl‘.
So now not only was I listening to the Superbowl and hearing the thoughts of the commentators, I was also listening to the Superbowl and getting instant reaction on the game from thousands of people around the globe. Every touch down and fumble of the game, somebody had something to say. The Twitterverse were massive fans of the half time show with Bruce Springsteen, me included!
What was also fascinating to watch was the continous stream of tweets about the snow which is hitting the UK at the moment. People in London commenting on the status of their street, how Boris had cancelled all the buses and the tweets as people slowly realised they weren’t going to make it to work. Despite being 1,000 miles away in a snowless Aberdeen, I almost felt I was a part of it.
I know next time something, god forbid, major happens I’ll be logging on to Twitter so get a better understanding of what’s going on.
It even lets me know what minor celebrity Richard Bacon had for lunch, a vegetable biryani if you’re interested.
David (or @drl if you have Twitter)
Posted in Comments on the news, Famous People, Observations, Radio Highlights | Leave a Comment »
Tags: 5 live, bbc radio, commentary, superbowl, tweets, twitter