NFL's IT Chief Gears Up For His 25th Super Bowl

BobB-nw writes with this excerpt from NetworkWorld: "NFL IT guru David Port claims he doesn't have a favorite football team, but on Sunday he'll be working his 25th Super Bowl. As the league's vice president of information technology, Port and his IT staff are responsible for building a temporary network to support NFL staff and thousands of journalists during Super Bowl week. Port starts preparing for each Super Bowl two years in advance, working with the city and venues where IT operations and media professionals will be based. More intensive planning starts about 11 months before the big game. Port explained that the NFL essentially built a small data center with IBM blade servers at the temporary headquarters in a local Marriott near the Super Bowl site. 'We built out an infrastructure with approximately 300 computers, PCs and laptops, and wired and wireless networks that are used for NFL core operations, for game production and business operations. Much of it is also for media,' Port said." CNet is running a related story about the technology behind the Super Bowl, focusing on some of the visual effects viewers will see, as well as the hardware that makes everything happen.

Comments

Dave is a great guy

[Controlio]

Having personally worked with him on SBXL, I can tell you that Dave is a great guy who knows what he's doing. The level of planning is amazing, not to mention the equipment they travel. They bring their own phone network (refusing to use even brand new state-of-the-art switches the house may own), a ridiculous amount of fiber, have fatter data pipes than some small countries, and are completely flexible to individual needs. It's completely night-and-day from any other sports event (including the World Series, Stanley Cup, and the Final Four).

He also has a bunch of really cool toys. Between him and the FCC, they can pinpoint an unlicensed RF transmitter within 5 feet in under 3 minutes and have it shut down. And yes, this happens multiple times in each super bowl, usually with foreign media.

Re:Dave is a great guy

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, I was going to skip the Super Bowl, but you're making it sound kind of interesting.

Re:Dave is a great guy

[Leetum]

Handheld portable radio, tuned to the frequency in question, and a directional antenna. When signal's stronger, antenna's pointing at the source of the issue. Get two or three people working it, can triangulate the source pretty quickly. A lot of amateur radio operators do this sort of thing for fun, its called a "fox hunt".

Re:Dave is a great guy

[Pfhreakaz0id]

You obviously do not realize that here in the US most universities would not exist without the income generated by their football(US) teams.

Actually, most, if not all, college athletic depts. lose money. See "Beer and Circus" or any of the other books on the subject. They use some real creative accounting to hide this.

Re:Dave is a great guy

[gtbritishskull]

I am sure that the football programs lose money. They are not intended to fund themselves from ticket sales. But, a lot of alumni come back to the colleges to watch the games. This makes them more connected to the college and more likely to donate money to the college. I do not have a cite, but I remember reading about the correlation between alumni donations and football wins and it was definitely a positive correlation. I don't think that we wouldn't have colleges without football, but they would have to find some other way to get their alumni involved to get them to donate or raise tuition.

Re:Dave is a great guy

[bru_master]

I Worked for Dave and crew at the last Superbowl in Phoenix. I was the wireless vendor that the Superbowl hired for the outdoor wireless. Everything that Controlio says is true. He is a great guy, they have there act together and he is a good man to work for. He led the entire site from weeks before to the week after. Three weeks later I received a hand written thank you card and a gift from Dave. In a world of thankless days, I have kept the thank you note on my desk from Dave Port, He seems to have this game plan down.
I guarantee he did not watch any of the game tonight, he was running the show. Next week he will sleep!!

Pointless article

[Anonymous Coward]

Can I please get back the 5 minutes that I spent reading the article?. he article had no details about the uplink to the internet/ISP. No details as to the number of hits the web server can handle. No information (not even looking for details) about the firewall.. just a pointless article.

Actually...

[Vertana]

Offhand I can say that the NFL's needs are FAR greater in respect to media needs during the Superbowl as opposed to the World Series, but just in case, I found a link in about 5 seconds on Google.

Re:Color me unimpressed

[Kaleo]

The SB is the most watched entertainment even in the US. Every year. And you want to compare it with MLB? What a joke. Color me unimpressed.

Re:Ninnle Ad at Halftime?

[Nimey]

Not true. It's really going to be a 30-second showing of Last Measure, complete with the "Hey everybody, I'm looking at gay porno!" soundtrack.

Re:No Ads

[carlzum]

The Super Bowl without ads is like an adult movie on American network TV. Even avid football fans find the game boring. The neutral-site stadium is filled with disinterested corporate types, the pace is even slower than a typical NFL game, and the teams tend to play very conservative. The game must be unwatchable for anyone without a rooting and/or monetary interest.

So why do so many Americans watch it? The ads, parties, beer, salted snacks, and gambling. Don't get me wrong, Americans love football, but Super Bowl Sunday has evolved into a national holiday. Football is as important to the Super Bowl as Jesus is to Christmas.

outsource the superbowl

[weighn]

It's my first superbowl (well, could be). Tried to watch before but just couldn't get to grips with all the stops and starts.

Anyway, go Ben Graham - 1st Australian to play in a superbowl final.

Next year, how about you outsource all the tech to Putin's Russia. You know, just as an international gesture of goodwill ... MalwareBowl

Re:No Ads

[elrous0]

Most of us Americans feel the same way about soccer (or football, if you prefer). Watching a soccer game is like watching a seemingly never-ending slog towards someone FINALLY scoring a single fucking goal. But, then, we all see our favorite sports through our own eyes. To each his own.