Most watched event of 2005: NFL's Superbowl

And especially considering overcounting in China was previously documented by FIFA.

 

Holy crap. I love American Football, and forgive me, but it's just hilarious to see people get offended by others calling it names.

 

Your're comparing criticism of NFL to racist remarks? come on.
The No Fun League is undisputed #1 sport in America so theyre not about to
lose sleep if a couple of people trash it in a soccer forum.

 

It's not offensive. It's just not funny.

 

I was in Europe over the summer, and I remember reading in a newspaper that over 20% of the Euro population had watched the champions league final. Europe has more than 700 million people, so that would mean 140 million people watched the game in Europe alone. This is consistent with other numbers I've seen before for previous champions league finals and Euro Cup games.

 

He was here briefly, but he lives in New England fulltime.

I actually used that on him once, though, when a waiter at a brewpub we went to was particularly helpful. I thought it was funny.

I still use it to this day. It's an homage and a ballbuster all in one. It's great.

 

Bollocks, mate. Absolute bollocks. The NFL by saying "potentially" 1 billion is absolutely implying that the NFL is way more popular than it is. Why the ********** else would they say it???

 

Ummm....because its true??? When you create a press kit for a big event like the Super Bowl, you include all kinds of data....one of which is potential audience. And I'm not even sure the NFL is making a huge deal of the potential audience number. Again, are you willing to find a link to where they touted the number and tied it to popularity? I mean, I've heard it mentioned, but its usually not coming from the league itself. If its such bollocks then surely you can easily find ample evidence to prove your point, right?

 

But the figures say 98% of the audience were from North America? So it's not true then is it?

 

Of course no one can cite any such numbers now, because the NFL wised up.
They have been careful about not using "actual viewers", but "potential viewers" nowadays. But that wasn't the case in the past.

You know, I have been known as a big NFL fan here in this forum. I'll do anything to defend the NFL against gridiron bashers here, especially those narrow-minded immigrants who come to this country and think that Americans should give up following gridiron and embrace European soccer.

However, I've repeatedly bashed the NFL for this non-sense of boosting how the Super Bowl was drawing a billion global audience. And I've started this argument at least in the late 90s, in other forums.

Take a look at this page from web.archive.org, from www.nfl.com back in 1998.

http://web.archive.org/web/19990508052502/www.nfl.com/news/981101sbfacts.html

"Last year's game was the third most watched program in television history, with more than 133.4 million viewers in the United States. The game was broadcast to 144 countries and territories and viewed by more than 800 million households worldwide."

This statement was made in November 1998, so the Super Bowl they refered to was the Broncos/Packers SuperBowl in January 98.

"The game was viewed by more than 800 million households worldwide"?

It was not "available to 800M household but those people didn't really watched". It was "****WAS VIEWED BY**** more than 800M households". It means 800M household ***TUNED IN AND WATCHED THE GAME***, in the wee hours in Europe and central/western Asia, and in the early morning hours in eastern Asia/Aussie/NZ on a working Monday, on a game that they don't understand whatsoever. Go to China and ask them what a safety is. They'll probably tell you Norton antivirus....

And it's not 800M viewers, but 800M households. which meant more than 1 billion viewers.

Of course, the NFL wise up now. Instead of putting up an outright LIE on their website, they simply put a misleading statement of "potential audience".

 

Okay, you got me......over 7 years ago they made an innacurate claim, then stopped doing it since. Yeah, that's some real damning evidence that the NFL is always claiming a billion people watch the Super Bowl annually....which was the accusation made earlier in this thread.

 

YES IT IS!!!!! Do you need me to link to a definition of the word "potential"?? For someone who is either English or likes to use English slang, you sure have a poor grasp of the mother tongue.

 

Where in the original accusation mentioned "always"? that's interesting...

 

You're right...not always...just normally. Silly me, I don't think once in 7 years qualifies as normally. Agreed.....it's interesting.

 

And you can look up the word imply. Muppet.

 

Ok, since you want to nitpick on wording, you are on.

AZSaint claimed that the NFL ***NORMALLY PREDICTED an audience of 1 billion audience". A prediction is a prediction, you can **always predict** that USA will win the World Cup but that doesn't mean you are claiming USA is always winning the World Cup.

So the orignal argument is NOT about "the NFL always claiming X", AZSaint's original argument was about "the NFL always predicting X"

My post has nothing to do with predicting. My post was about a statement of fact from the NFL. The NFL were wrong one time on what they claimed. It doesn't give you ammunition against "what they always claim", since the original argument from AZSaint was NOT about what they always claim, but what they ***normally predict***.

 

No. The point I'm trying to make is the implications of the statement. The NFL are clearly (duh!) implying that the Superbowl is watched by 1 billion people. Who really pays attention to the world 'potential?'. No-one. When I moved to the States people were absolutely GOBSMACKED to hear that no-one in England watched it. And I mean GOBSMACKED. Why do you think that is? Because every year they hear the billion figure bandied around and they believe it. And I would bet money that the word 'potential' is ommitted from the TV coverage of the event this year as it probably is every year.

Jesus, why are you guys so sensitive? It's only the Superbowl ffs.

 

Honestly, you've got to be the most ridiculous person I've ever debated with.

 

According to you...I'm not sure how many other ways there is to state that the program is available for watching by 1 billion people. Which, whether you care to admit it or not, is a fascinating stastic. They also report on the number of press passes given out, and the number of countries from which media members are visiting. None of those are made up, nor do they imply anything. Just because you are too dense to hear the word "potential" does not mean they are intent of fooling the audience by using it. DUH!

 

As long as this is a debate, why do you think I'll let exchange "predict" and "claim"?