ITV taps into social media for FA Cup Final

If you’re an English football fan, there aren’t many better games than the FA Cup Final. This year, football fans will be able to watch the real time buzz around the FA Cup final thanks to a unique experiment by ITV.com, pulling together the latest social media apps and some rapid-fire moderation.

ITV is integrating applications built around the successful micro blogging tool Twitter to reflect the online ‘noise’ generated by the clash between Everton and Chelsea on 30th May. Twitterfall – a site which cascades comments made on Twitter - will be embedded into the football section of itv.com on the day of the game, allowing fans to see ‘tweets’ about the match or any of the players, as it progresses. A tool developed by London company thruSITES will allow fans to see which of the players is generating the most chatter on Twitter: the players’ names and faces will appear alongside bars which will move up and down to reflect the buzz around players during the game. The tool will be available after the match so that fans can scrub along a timeline to see which players caused a buzz at crucial moments. Fans will also be able to submit their thoughts using web based audio comment service AudioBoo. The application will allow iPhone users to submit their comments to the site for other fans to hear.

Finally, user-generated content moderation company eModeration will be there to make sure that the only ’fouls’ which may take place are those on the pitch ...eModeration will be monitoring the text and audio feed and moderating where required, real time, trying to ensure that valid Tweets go live onto the site within 30 seconds of them being posted.

It’s going to be a great opportunity for the hopes and fears of the fans to be shared by everyone: social media at its most exciting, crowd-reporting on one of Britain’s most popular sports events.
The tools will be available on the site on a special FA Cup Buzz page from around 1pm on 30th May. The page will be accessed via http://itv.com/football.

Dominic Cameron, MD of ITV.com, said: “Our experiments with social media show that fans of our shows, especially the big live events, love to share their thoughts with others on the web in real time. Social media can really transform the way we all enjoy those memorable moments on ITV.

“This experiment is a great way of reflecting the buzz about the game on our site and if it’s a success, will no doubt pave the way for more efforts to engage football fans in new and interesting ways.”

Tamara Littleton, CEO of eModeration added: “We’re really excited to be supporting ITV.com and the other companies involved in this ground-breaking project. It’s a great demonstration of how the different elements of the social media sphere can be joined up to give lovers of the game an amazing picture of the thoughts and feelings of their fellow fans, real time. It should be a great match!”