The Janet Jackson uncovered incident has become the most replayed moment ever in US sports history, according to digital video recorder service TiVo, which uses its technology to monitor what viewers are watching.
A flurry of apologies and an investigation by the US broadcasting watchdog, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), were sparked when a "wardrobe malfunction" caused Justin Timberlake to expose Jackson`s breast in the halftime show at Sunday`s US Super Bowl football final. The show was broadcast to 160 million people, mostly Americans.
FCC chairman Michael Powell, a user and admirer of TiVo`s technology who is on record as calling it "God`s machine", was not amused by the incident.
"I am outraged at what I saw during the halftime show of the Super Bowl. Like millions of Americans, my family and I gathered around the television for a celebration. Instead, that celebration was tainted by a classless, crass and deplorable stunt. Our nation`s children, parents and citizens deserve better," he said in a statement.
According to TiVo, the moment drew the biggest spike in audience reaction the young technology company has ever measured. Viewership spiked 180% as hundreds of thousands of households used the system`s capabilities to pause and replay live television to view the incident again and again.
According to TiVo`s analysis of aggregated data from an anonymous sample of 20 000 households, viewership of the game`s intermission increased by 12% compared to last year`s halftime show.
Other reports say the incident also generated more Internet traffic than the 11 September terror attacks. Terra Lycos said in a survey of top Internet searches that it was proving to be the "most searched" event in the history of the Internet.
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