It occurred to me that 2010 will be the first World Cup where social networking sites will significantly influence how people support and cheer for their teams.
Think about it: the average computer user was blissfully ignorant of sites like Myspace or Friendster, until Facebook went mainstream around 2007. And Twitter? Twitter hit the scene in 2006 and I'm pretty sure that (with the notable exception of Ashton Kutcher) the vast majority of us resisted tweeting until the past year or so. Personally, I'm still holding out on that one.
So, out of curiousity, I logged into my Facebook account and did a quick search using the phrase "World Cup Portugal" which returned 66 pages.
Here are some of the ones that grabbed my attention:
Queremos a Seleccao com bigode na Africa do Sul You may have heard of this one: 54,000 fans and counting are trying to convince Portugal's team to grow moustaches for the World Cup. Sadly, Paulo Ferreira has already gone on record as saying it's not going to happen because he does not want to be made fun of.
READY FOR 2010 WORLD CUP!! FORCA PORTUGAL!! This is actually a really handy group page; they owners have posted the match schedule, multiple video clips and have some discussions going. If you are a fan of "one stop shopping" this is the page for you.
im supporting portugal and ronaldo in the world cup! The page description says it all - "i hate football but am willing to support portugal as ronaldo plays for them and is fit as..." Yes, this one's for the ladies, and anyone in general who appreciates Cristiano Ronaldo's fine work in the Armani campaign.
All the good players portugal has had but have not won a world cup Based on the name, I thought this one would be a fun trivia page but it turns out it's just a grammatically questionable expression of a few fans' frustration.
What are your thoughts? Are you cheering for Portugal on Facebook? Would you rather tweet your love for the team?
Note on yesterday's post: the link to the Nike "Write the Future" video was not working so if you'd still like to check it out, click here.
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