Slashdot Mirror
Will World Cup Streaming Cause Internet Meltdown?
MetaNick writes "It seems with every worldwide sporting event, e.g., Olympics, World Cup, we hear warnings of a "meltdown" as more and more broadband users attempt to stream video of the event to their browsers. And such predictions have just begun for the World Cup just getting underway: World Cup streaming to cause network meltdown, World Cup by broadband endangers networks. Has this ever really happened? Will it happen with this the World Cup just getting underway? I tend to doubt it. I looked for articles discussing how predictions of meltdowns did NOT come to pass, but I couldn't find any."
See, if they said something like that, then everyone would go "duh - I thought the news was supposed to tell me stuff I didn't know".
Instead, they make up some headline suggesting something extraordinary like "OMG! The "other" football is going to make teh Interweb MELT! Run for the hills! Details at 10.". And then "discuss" in the article about how that something extraordinary is very unlikely to happen, and really all that will happen is "Online coverage of World Cup predicted to cause increase in bandwidth usage across the globe".
Voila, perfect formula for making up a news article if you have no other news to report.