Social media at scale and London 2012

This page holds a collection of examples, links and videos on digital media and sport, and the use of social media at scale for events like London 2012. We are looking for your ideas and suggestions. If you have a good article, video or case study that should be listed here, please let us know by email, or on Twitter with the hashtag #nestahottopics.

The Social at Scale Hot Topics event will focus on the challenge of bringing social technology to scale for the London 2012 Games. A sense of community has always been central to the success of the Olympic Games but now ubiquitous broadband, mobiles and social technology are adding a whole new dimension. Audiences are no longer just spectators, they are 'content creators' - 7,196 tweets per second were sent during the climax of 2011's Women's World Cup. From online coverage to results apps and venue guides, technology must be robust at a massive scale but also have room for a personal touch.

This event will look at the challenge of using social technologies to scale, and explore how the Olympic partners are working alongside a new set of 'content creators' to best capture the London 2012 story.

Social media are not based on new technologies, but the social impact takes much longer to put together. Clay Shirky, NYU Interactive Telecommunications Professor says in his 2009 TED talk that "these tools don't get socially interesting until they get technologically boring"

There are a number of trends and challenges that come with social media for major events:

• More data, more coverage -mobile apps, citizen reporters and blogs means those attending in person can access more information than ever before, and those who can't be there can experience some of the same excitement.
• Second screen viewing - watching broadcast television alongside a stream of social media comments and participation enhances the experience and can increase viewing figures
• Convening supporters - convening but not controlling fans and supporters who can contact each other as easily as the athlete they are supporting
• Scale and survival - anything done for the Olympic Games needs to support huge amounts of traffic and be very secure, so being on the cutting edge is a challenge.
• Mass participation and personal experience - big events are built from shared experiences as well as personal stories.

More data, more coverage

Due for release by May 2012, there are plans for several different official apps for London 2012 including Results app and Torch relay app. The main precedent is the official mobile app developed for Vancouver 2010 which was downloaded over 1.2 million times and contained a searchable event schedule, live results, news, medal counts, photos and videos, maps and location awareness. Vancouver Winter Olympics 2010 was labeled the first 'social games', and if the games in Canada are anything to go by we should expect a myriad of London 2012 apps to soon enter the market to help you do anything from finding sports rules to even just cheering.

TfL is also currently running a high speed procurement of a web-based freight journey planner and interactive map to help operators reduce congestion and minimise disruption during the Games.

Second screen viewing

Second screen viewing refers to watching television, whilst browsing the internet or participating in social networks on your laptop, phone or tablet. This can create a layer of interactivity and conversation alongside the broadcast medium. ReadWriteWeb summarises the trend here.

Nielsen reported in 2010 that one in seven people watching the Super Bowl and the Olympics opening ceremony were surfing the web at the same time. 

In July, the climax to the Women's World Cup final between the US and Japan set a new Twitter record for the highest number of tweets per second (TPS) at 7,196. Only recently beaten by Beyonce...

20,000 watch Ascot United vs. Wembley FC in for the first ever FA Cup match streamed live by Budweiser on Facebook, joining the 1,149 spectators that turned up to the stadium in Ascot!

¨The Olympics will do for digital media what the Queen's coronation did for TV¨, according to the BBC as they prepare to become the first host broadcaster in history to deliver the Olympics live, multiplatform and in high definition. They intend to broadcast a record 5,000 hours of Olympic action, extending BBC3's hours to broadcast predominantly Olympics coverage as well as a dedicated London 2012 digital radio station.

This video looks at the changes in technology and development of digital media since the BBC's first coverage of the Olympics in 1948.

A good roundup of the best apps, blogs, maps and channels for the Beijing Games 2008 is here, with mentions of Wired, the BBC, Google and Reuters. 

Convening supporters

The ability to form direct connections between athletes and fans through twitter, Facebook pages and blogs can help to build support, humanising the competitors and making connections with fans.

The Olympics Committee have also released social media guidelines to officially encourage the 10,500 competing athletes from 200 countries to 'take part in social media and to post, blog and tweet their experiences', as long as their efforts are not for commercial purposes.  Stipulations include no vulgarity or curse words and "a first person and diary-type format", so events are not reported in the manner of journalists (full document here).

Sportpost.com is Europe's first "sport social media site", mixing professionally-produced branded channels with user-generated content including forums, videos and blogs. The site had signed exclusive deals to publish personal blogs from athletes including England rugby international James Haskell and has already accumulated an impressive range of commercial partners.

Scale and survival

The Olympic Games are a difficult place to introduce new technology. The scale of the event means everything must be robust, tested and able to support massive participation. But they can also push new forms of media out to a much larger audience.

In January 2011, the London Olympics organisation began 200,000 hours of stress testing from its 2000m2 testing lab to ensure all the technology behind the games runs smoothly. The technology runs everything from the timing of track events to the logistics of getting competitors around and the volunteer portal. 

The technology for 2012 will be the responsibility of seven partners, led by Atos Origin that has coordinated the technology for the last six Olympics. The server for the games will be housed in West Lothian Scotland, Atos tasked with protecting the Olympic IT network from cyber attacks; the company thwarting an incredible 12,000 attempts by hackers to bring down the system during the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

As the official communications partner, BT are aiming for London 2012 to be the most connected Olympics ever. BT communications services infrastructure will carry every official photograph, every sports report, and every visit to the London 2012 Games website, along with millions of calls, emails, and text messages - adding up to an incredible 7,860 megabytes per second across their network.

Mass participation and personalised experience 

With the aim to capture the spirit of London 2012's audience as content creators, the company has created BT Storytellers. The campaign brings together 100 people from across the UK to tell the story of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, from just before One Year to Go (27th July) right through to Games-time itself. The Storytellers will use a variety of creative methods to tell their stories, from Twitter posts and blogs, to art and poetry, photography, film and music. The BT Ambassadors, a selection of sporting personalities from household names to Olympics hopefuls, will also contribute, providing the competitors side of the story.

#media2012 is a project to create a collective citizen media network during the Olympic and Paralympic Games; aiming to build an artist-led community media hubs across the UK to draw in stories from the nations and regions across the games.

There were examples of similar projects during 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. Vancouver Access 2010 is a collection of multimedia content including blogs, pictures and videos; they also previously covered Beijing 2008 and Torino 2006. True North Media House is a media collaboration campaign to encourage social coverage of major events, highlighting emerging media and provide a venue for discussing the increased use of social media in society, particularly at events of global importance like the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. Anyone could take part from photographers to videographers and bloggers, you just needed to get accredited. There was even a five year old accredited reporter!

More links:

• UK Sports Network - a blog about social media and digital technology in the sports industry  
• Race for Apps - a competition to crowdsource mobile apps for visitors coming into the area during the 2012 Games 
• The Sports Networker asked their readers what the future of sports social media would look like, answers ranged from virtual coaching to the extinction of internet forums.