The number of visitors to Fifa's official Web site hit a record high of 265 million pages viewed by nearly 10 million visitors on 15 June when Brazil beat Korea.
The soccer governing body says these figures surpass the previous daily record, which was set on 22 June 2006 when Italy played the Czech Republic and 250 million views were generated.
Fifa adds that the 265 million views on 15 June builds on the total of 1.6 billion pages on the site accessed by nearly 53 million individuals in the first two weeks of June, which itself is a record.
A total of 48 million unique users visited Fifa's site over the entire four weeks of the 2006 World Cup, according to the governing body.
Dysfunctional site
World Wide Worx MD Arthur Goldstuck says this record has little to do with Internet growth in SA and everything to do with the intense global interest in the World Cup.
“This is by sheer force of numbers and momentum the World Cup with the greatest Internet following yet, and if they didn't keep breaking records like this, something would be even more seriously wrong than what is known to be a dysfunctional Web site.”
He adds that international soccer followers, especially in countries where the news media don't see the World Cup as the key story of the next few weeks, are the ones turning to the Fifa site.
“A large number of South Africans would be visiting the site, but they tend to have better local sites where they can get up to date information in a more user-friendly environment. Many of the local news groups, like Mail & Guardian, Avusa and News24, all have better soccer coverage than the Fifa site.”
Another record
“The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) has shattered the highest viewership ever recorded for a TV station with its broadcast of the opening match of the Fifa World Cup,” says the SABC.
It adds that no TV channel in this country has ever reached such performances for any event, including the first democratic elections.
“The average combined in-home audience for the 11 June match was 10 146 793 viewers on the two local channels SABC1 and SuperSport 3. This combined audience is 39% higher than last year's highest sports TV audience which was also broadcast across both channels, namely the semi-final of the Fifa Confederations Cup 2009 (7.35 million) when Brazil knocked out host South Africa,” says Fifa.
The SABC attributes part of the large viewership of the opening match to its partnership with Sentech and the Department of Communications, to provide low signal transmitters to rural areas in some parts of the country.
Goldstuck says the site still generated a large number of page views despite the high TV viewership because “during a game, TV only shows what's happening in front of your eyes, not what's gone before (aside from action replays), what's to be expected, and what people think about what's happening. TV may be immediate, but it has no depth within that immediacy, and that's where the Internet plugs a huge gap.”
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