Google and the World Cup

A recent article on the eWeek website suggests that Google is probably not a great fan of the World Cup. The main reason presented is that during the world cup the whole world (ok, not including the US) is watching TV, instead of the Internet, cheering for their favorite teams. Not a Google thing for Google, which relies on people to see more and more Internet in order to increase its ad revenue.

However, despite these problems, one needs to realize that the World Cup presents great opportunities for Internet companies. For one, soccer fans need information about games, commentary on the matches, and to talk to other fans.

In fact, Google is already making money from the World Cup. They run along with Nike a soccer website (joga.com), which provides an online community for soccer fans worldwide. Moreover, the increased activity on blogs, forums, and other web sites that run adsense code can translated into added revenue for Google.

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