Technology news and Jobs arrow Information Technology News arrow Out of the Ashes rises the “online” phoenix
Out of the Ashes rises the “online” phoenix E-mail
by Sufia Tippu   
Thursday, 23 November 2006
When Srikala, an avid Indian cricket fan, downloaded the cricket scoreboard onto her desktop two years back to keep a track of who was getting mauled at the one-dayers, it was a sign of things to come – online.

Today, Australians have gone cricket crazy 'online' for the first day of the 2006 Ashes series. According to Internet content delivery firm, Akamai, which services 29 of the top 30 media companies around the world, Australian news websites were receiving more than 126,000 visitors per minute, representing a 70 per cent increase in Internet traffic to these sites.

The Akamai Net News Index showed that almost four times as many people were following the cricket online than those watching at the Gabba (Brisbane Cricket Ground).

Towards the end of play on day one, a major Australian sports website was receiving more than 11,700 unique visitors per hour as compared to a normal average of 3,000 visitors.

"Across the board, Australian news websites experienced an immediate 4- fold increase in visitors just before the first Ashes ball was bowled," said Stuart Spiteri, Director of Akamai in Asia Pacific.

"Following this initial spike, Australians continued to follow the game ball by ball in growing numbers. These results demonstrate that the Internet is becoming the dominant channel for Australians to get real time updates on major news and sporting events. Today's results reflect the similar massive online success of the ICC Champions Trophy, and proves that the Internet has come of age as the place to go for sports news.

"As consumers, and Australian cricket fans, look for real time information such as online scoreboards, video replays and audio streaming, they are turning to the Internet to find it," Spiteri said.

But India and more so in Bangalore where tech companies are aplenty, and cricket is one game that some techies would give their right arm for –online monitoring has become a way of life. “Though  many may not  have  high speed broadband connection at home or have streaming disabled at offices, we are still able to follow the game by going to the news websites or on the downloaded scoreboard on our PCs,” adds Srikala.{moscomment}
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