Support Football Tuesday, get CNN Tweets and polish the vuvuzela for Cannes
Football fever isn't going away anytime soon, as the International Marketing Council calls on South Africa to make today Football Tuesday in support the team in their game against France, which fans can follow on Twitter Buzz from CNN or they can follow the excitement at the Cannes Lions Beach Football World Cup, which starts today 22 June 2010 and finishes tomorrow.
Support Bafana Bafana today
The Football Tuesday call for South Africans to don their gold and green shirts and show coast-to-coast support for Bafana Bafana has come from the International Marketing Council. So wear your togs today with pride. Once the 2010 FIFA World Cup is over, the team can kick back and relax, courtesy of Protea Hotels, which has given every member of the squad - both players and support staff - vouchers to spend a weekend at a group hotel of their choice.
It's not beach ball
The Cannes Lions Beach Football World Cup, sponsored by Eurosport Television, will be played on the Plage du Palais, close to the Palais des Festivals, which will be transformed into a beach football pitch, complete with match officials, score board and crowd areas. Sixteen teams from around the world will compete in the event, with World Cup hosts South Africa facing Brazil in Group 1, England facing old rivals Argentina in Group 2 and Group 4 has neighbours USA and Canada going head-to-head. The winning team will be awarded its trophy at the Press, Design and Cyber Lions Awards Ceremony on Wednesday 23 June.
All abuzz at CNN
CNN is bringing its audience a dynamic and interactive way to follow the most popular conversations related to the 2010 FIFA World Cup, including the players, teams and overarching trending topics - ranging from security to vuvuzelas. Twitter Buzz provides online users an engaging way to view and participate in online conversations surrounding the World Cup in real time.
"We have committed to making our coverage truly global by putting fans at the centre and our interactive site gives them a unique and compelling complement to following the tournament, whether in person, on TV or exclusively online," said Nick Wrenn, vice president of digital services for CNN International. "From the vuvuzelas to goal flashes and red cards, you literally can see the buzz and tap into the debates around the world in real time across hundreds of thousands of tweets a day - and in different languages."
Bigger picture
Topics generating the most buzz related to the World Cup are represented visually through photos; and the more a topic is discussed, the larger its image appears in the interactive. While the interactive captures trending data in real time, it also includes a feature that allows users to scroll back through the tweets of matches from the previous 24 hours.
In the interactive visualisation, users can roll over the image to see how many tweets per minute the topic is generating. Additionally, by clicking on the image, users will see the five most recent related tweets and, utilizing Twitter's @Anywhere platform, can sign-in to their Twitter account to retweet or share a comment related to that part of the conversation. To participate, go to www.cnn.com/twitterbuzz.
