The 2011 @coldhawaii World Cup Mashup
Aim
On top of last year’s success the organizers of the 2011 KIA @coldhawaii PWA World Cup want to upgrade the online coverage of the event. This should take place under the heading “the most interactive event on the circuit.” This should happen through a carefully planned strategy for using social media, and a general upgrade of all elements of the mashup, which was developed for the event in 2010. In 2011 the mashup should also include a (as nearly as possible) live scoreboard, which should, for the first time ever, integrate all counting scores in the broadcast of a PWA event.
Target groups
Everybody who is passionate about sailing: young and old, practitioners and spectators, pros and amateurs, and also the curious and everybody with an interest in knowledge, social media, technologies, and innovation.
Project period
May 15th to October 1st. The KIA Cold Hawaii PWA World Cup takes place from September 12th to September 18th 2011. The venue is the Klitmøller, better known as the capital of the Cold Hawaii.
Partners
The NASA Surf club
Professional Windsurfing Association
ACTIVE institute
ACTIVE’s role in the project
Overall responsibility for all online production:
- Setting up the website
- Logistics and production flow
- Scheduling of all content
- Recruitment of developers and media crew
- Full project and process management.
Live scoring:
- Needs analysis
- Idea and concept development
- Fundraising
- System selection
- Selecting suppliers
- Full project and process management throughout the entire event.
Social media:
- Development of strategy for using social media
- Ongoing guidance and support
- Full project and process management throughout the entire event.
Criteria for success
Training and use of various systems should happen quickly and easily so that the basic production is safe from the first day of the event. A fully digitized set to valid scores must be available after the event. The social media strategy should eventually result in a 25 percent increase in the number of fans on the event’s Facebook fan page.
Result
The needs analysis was conducted and resulted in a team totaling 31 persons. Of these, 21 were volunteers, who in a very short time were trained to organize and deploy a large part of the content that was published on the event website, Facebook fan page, Flickr account, YouTube channel, and Twitter. The production was under constant supervision by ACTIVE institute in close cooperation with the organizers and PWA.
The PWA as an organization is not yet ready to handle a situation in which the individual judge’s input is registered digitally by each judge. The next best option is thus to digitize scores immediately after each heat.
To be able to do this, a provisional system and workflow was developed to handle a situation in which a dedicated staff of tabulators received a carbon copy of each score-sheet right after the heat.
The system worked throughout the single and double elimination, which meant that scoring during the entire event was an integrated part of the broadcast. All valid scores could be found in an app placed immediately above the live streaming an average of approximately three minutes after the judges had handed in their score-sheet to the tabulators.
This means that the 2011 KIA @coldhawaii PWA World Cup places itself in history as the event which, for the first time ever, presented valid scores for all interested in following a PWA event – as close to live as possible.
The strategy for social media was conducted. Specifically, this resulted in roughly 1200 extra fans on the event’s Facebook page, which at the end of the event had 3150 fans. The strategy further resulted in over 500 more fans on KIA Denmark’s Facebook page, which was part of the criterion for success. Total Cold Hawaii Klout score at the event’s completion was 45.
Background
The collaboration between the organization behind the KIA @coldhawaii PWA World Cup and the ACTIVE institute is based on a vision of creating the most interactive event on the circuit.
The centre is the @coldhawaii World Cup Mashup, which is a combination of live video, live scores, live text and images provided by different teams using a variety of mostly free online social services.
The content was created through a collaboration of ACTIVE institute, StreamFactory and Big Sexy Pictures and organized and published through collaboration between ACTIVE institute and a team of volunteers.
