USA vs. England World Cup Match Was a Social Smash – But Not for the Players
The USA vs. England World Cup match was broadcast live to soccer (spelled “football” in British English) fans around the world via blogs like the Huffington Post, on the Washington Post’s site live chat during the stream was encouraged, and through partnerships with ESPN and Univision in the US (and 8 other stations around the world) Facebook users could watch and chat through dedicated apps and social network extensions {Facebook}, and Twitter even has a dedicated page providing a tweet by tweet view of the games. {Twitter} Verizon rolled out their V CAST service to Android phone users just in time to catch the action on their mobile phones, and Sprint users – including EVO 4G owners, could tune in on Sprint TV.
What's happening? For World Cup players, not much that they can share.
But if you’re hoping to get a first hand tweet or update from anyone directly on the pitch, you may be out of luck.
In addition to sex and alcohol, social networking now joins the list of banned activities for players on the Spanish, Brazilian, Mexican, Dutch, German, Argentine, Chilean and English teams. {Mashable} Brazil and Argentina players are allowed to have sex. Though in the case of the Argentina squad, coach Diego Maradona (himself, a former World Cup winner as a player for the national team) has restricted it to wives or girlfriends, and only without alcohol.
So how are those bans working out? Well, the South Africa vs. Mexico match ended in a draw as did today’s USA vs. England match. Argentina pulled out a win over Nigeria, but for the moment, that’s only a one out of three success rate. We’ll have to wait to see how Spain, Brazil, Holland and Germany fare, but so far banning online communication may have prevented embarrassing gaffes, but it doesn’t seem to have given the teams any advantages.
