ISSF announces that 590,000,000 watch the ISSF World Championships on TV

Sparks

No, not a typo, 590 million.

From the ISSF website:

ISSF World Championship recorded 590 Millions viewers

A record TV viewership was measured during the 2010 ISSF World Championship, indipendent monitoring company said.

“The 2010 ISSF World Championship held in Munich recorded the highest numbers of the TV viewers of any other shooting competition…” an independent audience-monitoring company stated, after measuring the TV coverage of the 50th ISSF World Championship.

The numbers of the report confirms it: 592 million people watched shooting on TV all around the world, and footage of the competition was made available to a potential audience of more then 2 billion of people. This exceptional results in terms of coverage and viewership were reached thanks to the collaboration between the ISSF, the Eurovision and some of the most important sport video-magazines, which distributed video highlights of the championship all around the world.

International Networks, National TV Stations, Cinemas, Airplanes: more then 450 broadcasters, from Oceania to North America, from Africa to Asia, requested and obtained live feed, videos, highlights, interviews and summaries of the championship and, as a result of it, more than 140 hours of TV were aired during the 10-day event.

Never before a shooting competition had reached such a worldwide coverage, as certified by some of the most important media consulting companies collaborating with the ISSF.

The focus on international media was combined with the usual care for the hardcore shooting fans: a full coverage of the championship was guaranteed on the ISSF website, and the 15 Olympic events were broadcasted live with English commentary, and more than 50 video clips were made available on-demand.

These results paid-off the exceptional resources invested by the International Shooting Sport Federation during this year’s world championship: twenty professionals including cameramen, satellite technicians and experts, more then ten cameras, five tons of materials and three trucks were used to make the best TV production ever possible.

It wasn't me!

That is bafflingly huge. That's nearly one in every ten people on earth.

dCorbus

You sure that's not a typo, sparks?
That figure seems unrealistically high for worldwide viewership.

Great if it's true - It's a nice figure to bring to any potential sponsors!!!;)

Sparks

It's not a typo of mine dC
I'm guessing they're counting the full audiences of all the outlets that took up the feeds, rather than using neilson ratings (but then, they'd be unavailable in all but a few cases).

Mr Mole

Eastenders or a Dulux Paint Drying Demo must have been on the other Channels

IRLConor

Mr Mole wrote: »

Eastenders or a Dulux Paint Drying Demo must have been on the other Channels

Or whatever their Chinese & Indian equivalents are!

I think the phrase "an independent audience-monitoring company stated" is the most important bit to remember. Audience monitoring in my experience is right up there with homeopathy for pseudo-science. Maybe the particular company the ISSF hired were good, honest and smart but I've seen too much non-random selection, tiny sample sets and marketing-optimistic extrapolation to trust them without seeing their methods.

I wouldn't be surprised with tens of millions of viewers but I find hundreds of millions hard to believe. Then again, the 2010 Soccer World Cup estimated an audience of 26 billion, so maybe ISSF work in the same la la land as FIFA with regard to viewership. :rolleyes:

It wasn't me!

IRLConor wrote: »

Or whatever their Chinese & Indian equivalents are!

I think the phrase "an independent audience-monitoring company stated" is the most important bit to remember. Audience monitoring in my experience is right up there with homeopathy for pseudo-science. Maybe the particular company the ISSF hired were good, honest and smart but I've seen too much non-random selection, tiny sample sets and marketing-optimistic extrapolation to trust them without seeing their methods.

I wouldn't be surprised with tens of millions of viewers but I find hundreds of millions hard to believe. Then again, the 2010 Soccer World Cup estimated an audience of 26 billion, so maybe ISSF work in the same la la land as the ISSF with regard to viewership. :rolleyes:

It's still just a niche sport in Alpha Centauri.

rrpc

IRLConor wrote: »

Or whatever their Chinese & Indian equivalents are!

I think the phrase "an independent audience-monitoring company stated" is the most important bit to remember. Audience monitoring in my experience is right up there with homeopathy for pseudo-science. Maybe the particular company the ISSF hired were good, honest and smart but I've seen too much non-random selection, tiny sample sets and marketing-optimistic extrapolation to trust them without seeing their methods.

I wouldn't be surprised with tens of millions of viewers but I find hundreds of millions hard to believe. Then again, the 2010 Soccer World Cup estimated an audience of 26 billion, so maybe ISSF work in the same la la land as FIFA with regard to viewership. :rolleyes:

A couple of things that may not be obvious to us island dwellers on the westernmost point of Europe; Shooting is huge in countries like Norway, Switzerland, Germany and Russia. Not to mention the former Soviet states. When Marcel Buerge won his Olympic medal, he gained almost superstar status in Switzerland. He freely admits he got his head turned by the whole experience and went a bit off the rails. But all that pales into insignificance when compared to countries like India and China. The Chinese are rapidly moving up the international shooting ladder and their merest sniff is broadcast to the nation. In India, sport is seen as a way out of the poverty trap and although its climate doesn't suit such sports as soccer or rugby, shooting is one of the upcoming alternatives. Although the sport is still only available to the well off, audiences will tune in if one of their own is taking part. Add those two together and 590 milliion is still a significant figure, but not by any means outrageous.

Put it this way; if an Irish shooter was in with a chance of a medal, there'd be coverage on RTE. The problem in the past was actually getting those feeds into Ireland because the market is so small and we're dependant on the main carriers to actually provide footage. Provide the coverage and people will watch if there's a local angle (which in the case of India and China, there was).

The good news about those figures (whatever there accuracy) is that they may persuade carriers to actually provide coverage of these events.