The Community Of Fans

Michael Hedges September 7, 2009 Follow on Twitter

Every sport has its rabid fans. Craziness aside, it’s the fans – and super-fans – who drive broadcast sports and sports marketing. New media gives broadcasters a new tool for building audience and revenue.

The Tour de France is cyclings premiere international event. Cycling fans will stop at nothing to get a glimpse of the action through the month of July. Television broadcasters – those with the broadcast rights – turn over their summer daytime schedules for the multitudes who just can’t get enough. For many broadcasters the Tour de France is a summer programming tradition.

The French, obviously, are rabid fans of the Tour de France. July audience figures from media measurement service Médiamétrie showed average daily audience France 2, France 3 and France 4, which shared the event, of 3.8 million viewers. The next to last stage drew 5.2 million and the final drew 6.6 million. Websites of the television channels received more than 4 million visits, three times more than July 2008. Médiamétrie also reported over one million internet users searched “Tour de France” during July, more than the next most searched subject by a factor of ten.

Norwegians are also rabid cycling fans, overtaking the Dutch as the most bicycle owning country in Europe. TV 2 carried the Tour de France and earned about 450,000 viewers. “We are amazingly happy with this year's Tour de France and the support for it,” said TV 2 sports director Bjørn Taalesen in a statement. Consider that Norway’s population is but one-fifteenth that of France.

TV 2’s Tour de France fans got an added bonus this year. In conjunction with new media technology company never.no, TV 2 offered fans a multimedia experience, everything from mobile applications to Web chats and Tweets. TV 2 managing editor Håavard Myklebust called it a “new way of experiencing the Tour de France — not just as passive viewers but as active participants."

Oslo-based never.no is a bleeding edge service provider. The company’s specialty is community TV, in this century’s definition. Its mission for TV 2 and the Tour de France was to give fans the tools to “express themselves in ‘conversation’ with other fans and with TV experts (to) create a unified social experience, transforming the disorganized cycle racing fan base into a loyal TV 2 sports community,” said never.no CEO Lars Lauritzsen in a statement.

Painful as it may seem to traditional media people, the simple broadcast model is fading to black. Media users – we must bury the term ‘audience’ as far too passive and simplistic – have adopted new media technologies and expect a relationship. Sports fans are particularly demanding and, as demonstrated by television operators like TV 2 Group, they’ll pay for the access. TV 2 Group, a joint venture of Norway’s A-pressen and Denmarks’ s Egmont, also offers TV 2 Sport, a pay TV channel. Interestingly, two of Norway’s major newspapers – Aftenposten and VG – have experimented with new media ‘communities’ – for fee.

The more new media people tout ‘conversations’ and ‘community’ the more old media people reach for the razor blades. For those steeped in one-way and top-down models  - and making tons of money with them – it’s a change traditional media doesn’t want to believe in. But the present seems to prove that the technology empowered public is rapidly adapting their behavior.

Communities of fans appear and disappear quickly. Indeed, it seems not simply an effect of new media but a quality of new media users.  People engage, disengage, then engage somewhere else. The “social experience” is a powerful attraction.

Sports organizers – largely but not exclusively American – are taking aim at new media lest control be lost over the ‘content’ they sell. The Unites States Tennis Association (USTA) warned players of “some of the dangers posted by Twittering” prior to the recent US Open. Some National Football League (NFL) teams have banned player Tweets on game days. Yes, of course, some of the concern is the effect on gambling. But rights holders and teams are claiming exclusive rights over any game action video, even if created by an individuals mobile phone.

New media is, well, new. The public is adapting. Technologies – developed by companies like never.no –  are facilitating wholly new experiences for those who wish to engage. A business model built around these communities of fans (sports being just one realm) is clearly on the rise.