IT Meets the World Cup

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Posted by ryuzaki0 on Friday June 9, 2006 @01:54AM from the tech-lends-a-foot dept.

daria42 writes "Looks as if there are some mad soccer fans at ZDNet ... they have compiled a guide to some of the IT systems behind the soccer World Cup. 'What does it take to design, build and operate an advanced, fault-tolerant IP network while the whole world watches?' one of the articles asks. Another looks at how broadcasters have beefed up their infrastructure as they prepare for an influx of fans desperate for information, while another looks at one of the upcoming matches: FIFA vs. Hackers."

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Soccer? by StonePiano · 2006-06-09 02:00 · Score: 5, Funny

I hadn't noticed a soccer event. Whatever 'soccer' is, it was bad timing to clash with the Football World Cup!
1. Re:Soccer? by 91degrees · 2006-06-09 02:05 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  It's an abbreviation for "Association football", used to distinguish it from the popular alternative version of football invented in Rugby by William Webb Ellis.
2. Re:Soccer? by skribe · 2006-06-09 02:36 · Score: 2
  
  900 years ago it was Germanic. Then the Normans invaded.
  
  --
  Blog
3. Re:Soccer? by StonePiano · 2006-06-09 02:42 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Actually, in English, it is called 'football'. That was the point of starting this 'Soccer?' thread.
  
  Now, Americans have a game they play with their hands, which they call, 'football'. I really enjoy American football (or grid-iron as we sometimes call it). It is more of a turn-based strategic game with complex rules and all the physicality of a train-crash. I like it.
  
  But football is a free-flowing game. It has a simplicity and a beauty that gives it unparalleled status as an international team sport.
  
  I for one am pleased to see the American team in the World Cup. They are improving and genuinely competing on the international scene nowadays.
  
  It probably does more for US/international relations than most diplomatic efforts.
4. Re:Soccer? by bheer · 2006-06-09 03:01 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  If you tune into any channel in the UK, or indeed any of their innumerable tabloids, it's "football" all the way. I don't know *who* uses the word 'soccer' in Britain, but America-returned Brits would come to mind.
  
  --
  Go somewhere random
5. Re:Soccer? by lolocaust · 2006-06-09 03:16 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  They were probably calling it soccer for your benefit.
  
  --
  Why does my post history abruptly stop? I want to laugh at the stupid things I posted as a kid.
6. Re:Soccer? by drsmithy · 2006-06-09 03:48 · Score: 2
  
  and before that, the romans were there.
  But it'snot like the Romans did anything for them...
7. Re:Soccer? by drsmithy · 2006-06-09 04:11 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Actually, in English, it is called 'football'. That was the point of starting this 'Soccer?' thread.
  There are many places in the world that use "soccer", not "football". Here in Australia, for example, where there are several other established codes of "football", "soccer" is by far the most common (and more importantly, least confusing) name.
  Saying "football" to a random Australian - depending upon which part of the country you're in and which part of the country (or world) the person you're talking to is from - could result in a conversation about any one of four quite different (well, only three of them qualify as "quite different) sports.
  It is more of a turn-based strategic game with complex rules and all the physicality of a train-crash. I like it.
  If you like American Football and Soccer, then Rugby Union is probably your dream sport. Most of the athleticism, dynamic and constant play of soccer, all of the body-crunching violence (plus interest) of American Football (only without the body armour)
  But football is a free-flowing game. It has a simplicity and a beauty that gives it unparalleled status as an international team sport.
  You cannot truly appreciate the fitness and incredible (and unmatched, IMHO) amount of whole-body co-ordination required to play soccer at a high level unless you've actually played the game competitively, IMHO.
  The real beauty of soccer - and the main reason behind its popularity - is that it scales all the way from a couple of kids kicking a dead dog's head around all the way up to an epic spectacle like the World Cup. You can play it anywhere, even with people who have never touched a ball before - yet players at the top level regularly perform feats with a ball the typical - even the above average - person couldn't even dream of replicating. Soccer is incredibly easy to just pick up, but simultaneously incredibly difficult to play well.
More importantly by Anonymous Coward · 2006-06-09 02:04 · Score: 5, Interesting

I'm more interested in what FIFA is going to do about the rampant racism that often surrounds European football more than what they'll do against hackers. It's very real and very scary for people of color (as Henry has talked about).
1. Re:More importantly by RahoulB · 2006-06-09 02:52 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  The clubs have the power to ban individuals from the grounds. In England you can expect a swift ejection and a ban for racism. But in some countries, a large proportion of the crowd can be making monkey noises and chucking bananas and UEFA (yes, I know, not FIFA) fine the club a few thousand Euros. If UEFA cared then they would put pressure on the clubs to take action. But they don't.
World cup? by Opportunist · 2006-06-09 02:10 · Score: 2, Funny

What world cup? Is there anything meaningful going on currently?

(spare me the answer. I wish I could cryo myself for a month)

--
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Yes, but is it streaming in the US? by Anonymous Coward · 2006-06-09 02:12 · Score: 2, Interesting

I think this was brought up recently - how can I watch the games streaming in the U$A?
1. Re:Yes, but is it streaming in the US? by Anonymous Coward · 2006-06-09 03:10 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  You can find a proxy that's located in the UK and use it.
  See:
  
  http://www.ghacks.net/2006/06/06/how-to-view-the-f ootball-worldcup-online/#more-542
Article submitter born yesterday? by xxxJonBoyxxx · 2006-06-09 02:13 · Score: 3, Informative

""Looks as if there are some mad soccer fans at ZDNet ... they have compiled a guide to some of the IT systems behind the soccer World Cup."
Or, ZDNet reprinted a four-page press release from the World Cup after the Cup spent four years soliciting IT sponsors. "Compiled a guide" my ass...
Damn US-centric website by Roadmaster · 2006-06-09 02:15 · Score: 4, Insightful

in most of the world, the World Cup is (dare I say it) more important than any other sporting event (yes, even the olympic games). It'd do good to US citizens to dig out of the hole and stop pretending; while you're at it you might as well start ditching the imperial measuring system. And yes, in most of the rest of the world, interesting matches are broadcast for free. lol!
1. Re:Damn US-centric website by UnixSphere · 2006-06-09 02:25 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  I live in the US and I love soccer(football), people ask why haven't we really adopted soccer as widely as the rest of the world did, it's still relatively young but things like this (charging to see the games) are impeding the wide adoptation of it. Companies are so short-sighed and just want to profit as much as they can, instead of stepping back and letting us American see the games for free and help build a soccer fan-base that could be comparable to any other.
2. Re:Damn US-centric website by OctoberSky · 2006-06-09 02:27 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  I can't argue with your statements. I was watching ESPN the other day and they were talking about how the Championship games (or series) are watched in terms of viewers. The Superbowl is tops in America at an absurd number like 90 million (from my memory someone else will prove me wrong) and the NBA and MLB finals came in well below at about 30 & 20 million respectively. Football (with a round ball) has the World Cup championship coming in at.. I have to type this one out... 1,300,000,000. That is 1.21 Billion more people than who watch the Super Bowl and that is in 2002. No one knows what 2006 will hold.
  The real question should be:
  What does it take to make Americans watch Football
  And not for nothing but I have only once in my life watched an entire game of Football/Soccer. Ireland v Italy from the Meadowlands, in 1994.
3. Re:Damn US-centric website by hrtserpent6 · 2006-06-09 02:48 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Soccer is *not* relatively young in the U.S. It has been a member of FIFA since 1914, and was one of 13 nations in the first World Cup in 1930.
  
  There are over 200 NCAA Division I men's soccer teams, and yet professional soccer in the U.S. is a curiosity at best. Why is this? I think the reasons may be more deeply rooted in the American need to be unique and dominant (see "American-invented sports" such as baseball, football, basketball, NASCAR, etc.) rather than in soccer's popularity or approachability. I will posit that *at least* 1 in 4 kids in the U.S. have played soccer at some point in their youths.
  
  But to say that soccer is not popular in this country because it is 'young' is patently false.
4. Re:Damn US-centric website by Spectra72 · 2006-06-09 03:53 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Why is America the only country that has to defend having sports other than soccer take center stage?
  
  Do people get their panties in a twist over Canada liking hockey more? Is it a deep rooted Canadian need to be unique and dominant? Does the fact that they also embrace a version of football that is not soccer piss the world off?
  
  Australians and New Zealanders like Aussie Rules Football or Rugby more. Why is that?
  
  India and Pakistan love their cricket. Any deep seeded psychological reasons the world would like to debate over that?
  
  China? What's their problem?
  
  The two most populous nations in the world and seven of the top 10 have no representation in Germany this World Cup and people say Americans have issues.
5. Re:Damn US-centric website by angle_slam · 2006-06-09 06:58 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  According to this article, about 130 million US viewers watched the 2006 Super Bowl. The Worldwide figure is about 1 billion (or, as you would put it: 1,000,000,000). Not bad for a sport that's played at a high-level professionally in only 4 countries (and even in the European countries, played primarily by Americans).
6. Re:Damn US-centric website by HillBilly · 2006-06-09 08:38 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  The only way companies in the US would let soccer take off in the US if the rules were changed to allow timeouts every minute to fit a million commericals in.
  
  --
  "Go into the hall of mirrors and have a bloody hard look at yourself" - HG Nelson
7. Re:Damn US-centric website by drsquare · 2006-06-09 10:34 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  Watching people get excited over an almost goal makes me laugh everytime.
  
  Watching people get excited at a basketball score every 2 seconds makes me laugh everytime. That really is the sport of people with ADD.
  
  Are you telling me gridiron fans don't get excited when one of their players is tackled just before reaching the tryline? Or that a baseball fan isn't excited when a player hits the ball that just falls short of going into the crowd?
  
  And penalties is no way in the world to decide a game - what a joke.
  
  Why not? It's the greatest and most nerve-wracking spectacle in sport. Nothing comes close.
  
  It's beautiful in its simplicity. A simple, twelve-yard kick. Not like in ice-hockey where you get to run up and get comfortable on the puck, you have to hit it cold. A penalty kick is the easiest thing to do in football, but in a situation where if you miss, your country is eliminated from the world cup, breaking the hearts of tens of millions of your countrymen watching on TV, it becomes the hardest thing to do in the world. It's so straightforward to score a penalty, that humiliation of missing is crushing, the pressure is unmatched anywhere in sport.
  
  The sixty-yard walk from the centre-circle to the penalty spot becomes sixty miles. The eight-foot by eight-yard goal becomes eight by eight inches. The six-foot seven goalkeeper becomes sixty feet tall, the ball is a lump of iron. Your legs become heavy, a billion people are watching you, waiting for you to fail and humiliate yourself.
  
  A joke? I don't think so.
8. Re:Damn US-centric website by Roadmaster · 2006-06-09 11:32 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  So what you're saying is that you prefer the game that's good for the tv company, the one where you get to enjoy the most advertisement... because, you know, you could switch channels...
9. Re:Damn US-centric website by glesga_kiss · 2006-06-09 13:35 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  I think it's the 2x45 minute playtimes. Makes it hard on TV companies to promote (less time for ads) and requires a lot of stamina for a casual player.
  
  TV aside, you're wrong there. Ever heard of the phrase "jumpers for goalposts"? Perhaps not, it may be a UK-only thing. Anyhow, soccer is one of the most accessible sports out there. All you need is a ball and something to mark the goals, which is more than enough for kids to develop a lasting interest. Hell, a year or so ago some friends and I were on a country road in a minibus. The road was blocked a mile away due to an accident. We got the ball and had a kick-around in the field next to the road. Most of us were over 30 and many have kids.
  
  On the other hand, some of us did play a little American Football when we were younger. I also played the Madden series a bit. Your football is way less accessible, there's far steeper learning curve. Watch soccer for five minutes and there isn't really much else to know. Of course, there's a lot more to it than that, tactics, formations, the "flow" of the game, but it's enjoyable even on a surface layer.
laugh if you will... by preppypoof · 2006-06-09 02:28 · Score: 2, Insightful

soccer is still not a widely accepted sport in the US, so while you laugh at what a "stupid" sport soccer is, the rest of the world is laughing at us for not supporting what could be a World Cup Championship calibur team this quatrain. when a foreign country wins the World Cup, there is literally partying and dancing in the streets, but sadly, that would not be the case should the US take the cup.
Re:Soccer is a boring sport that kids play... by CaymanIslandCarpedie · 2006-06-09 02:41 · Score: 4, Interesting

Kind of like the Super Bowl except more people watch a single World Cup than like every Super Bowl combined. Kind of like comparing the Super Bowl to a local youth championship in some sport.

--
"reality has a well-known liberal bias" - Steven Colbert
Another use of technology in World Cup by zaguar · 2006-06-09 02:51 · Score: 2, Informative

Students predict the outcome of the World Cup

They use some algorithms and a lot of data. For the record, with 83% accuracy, Brazil will beat Italy.

--
"Sure there's porn and piracy on the Web but there's probably a downside too."
1. Re:Another use of technology in World Cup by Inda · 2006-06-09 03:39 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  Being a huge football fan (21 minutes to go!) I have to say "Bollocks".
  
  "The first stage was gathering a lot of information. We went back 20 years and collected all sorts of information about the teams; things like team performance, score and scorers."
  
  Shame that the none of the teams and player are the same as 20 years ago. Injuries are going to play a major part in this year's cup and there is no way you can account for them.
  
  Want to predict the outcome? Go with the bookmakers. They are rarely wrong.
  
  --
  This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
Re:Why football (soccer) isn't more popular in N.A by Carewolf · 2006-06-09 03:00 · Score: 2, Insightful

So it's great when it happens a 100 times in a game?..

The excitement will take no end at the 101th time someone scores... yeaaaaayy
I'll tell you why... by citizenklaw · 2006-06-09 03:01 · Score: 5, Insightful

Advertising. Plain and simple.

Soccer does not stop for anything. There's no stopping for injuries, time-outs for strategies, etc. Soccer is the most dynamic sport on the planet, period. I really admire those guys spending 90 minutes running and doing stuff. I think that Soccer, as a TV spectator sport, has not catched on major networks because advertisers here in the US do not like it. There's no place for 30 second ads! Gasp! Egads! There's no place for gimmicky Super Bowl ads!

I really like Soccer, on TV and on the flesh. I really hope that the US team goes far this time, even though I'm rooting for other teams. That's the only way US spectators will notice and learn what the rest of the planet knows. Soccer RULES!

--
the future is but past forgotten
Re:Why football (soccer) isn't more popular in N.A by lbrandy · 2006-06-09 03:03 · Score: 2, Funny

wow. the ignorance in your post is something you don't see that often in /.

Wow is right. You must be new here. Welcome.
Re:Mad Soccer fans? by ReidMaynard · 2006-06-09 03:11 · Score: 2, Funny

For the last time, it's called Football!

Thanks goodness it's the last time, I'm tired of ya'all callin Soccer Football.

--
-- www.globaltics.net
Political discussion for a new world
Re:Why football (soccer) isn't more popular in N.A by tumbleweedsi · 2006-06-09 03:12 · Score: 2, Insightful

I am probably going to get modded troll by every north american here but this needs to be said. Football, or "soccer" as you so quaintly call it does not lack the strategy of american games however it does lack the 30 second break every two or three seconds so the teams can take a breather and the TV pundits can explain what just happened. Hockey is, and always will be, much more interesting when it is played by 18 year old girls rather than burley frat boys in pads and american "football" is an enigma: as Giles from Buffy said once, I have never understood why a nation which prides itself on its virility has to put on 40lbs of protective clothing just to play rugby. Football (not the american sort) has been labelled "the beautiful game" throughout the world because of the grace and skill needed to play it at a high level. The game has a true World Cup in which countries come together and compete on a level field... you do not need to be an american college frat boy to get into the team and some of the best players in the world have come from the poorest parts of the world. If you have not developed a love for fast paced games then it is likely you have not taken the time to understand how they are played and never felt the rush of watching your team win from a losing position.

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Re:Soccer is a boring sport that kids play... by nicklott · 2006-06-09 03:32 · Score: 3, Insightful

"A cumulative total of 30 billion viewers tuned into the FIFA World Cup 2002, of which one billion watched the Brazil-Germany final alone."
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=57 4061
Re:Don't mention the World Cup by IngramJames · 2006-06-09 03:50 · Score: 2, Interesting

It's more "World" than the "World Series".

Which is, as everyone knows, called "The World Series" because it was originally sponsored by a (now defunct) newspaper called "The World".

--
'No rational religion claims "supernatural" exists, that's an atheist slander.' - seen on slashdot.
Here is the real fun ... by gerddie · 2006-06-09 03:53 · Score: 2, Interesting

World Cup 2006 'abused for mega-surveillance project'
NATO surveillance planes to patrol World Cup

Erich Mielke would be happy.
Re:Don't mention the World Cup by gdr · 2006-06-09 04:41 · Score: 3, Informative

Wrong