Facebook’s sports product to launch during NFL championships

Facebook Sports Stadium will debut at the NFL’s conference championship games and then the Super Bowl.

Unlike the typical Facebook News Feed, the information appearing about big sporting events will appear in real-time and in chronological order, the key feature which makes Twitter the go-to social network for conversations around sporting events at the moment.

‘Facebook Sports Stadium’ is a new destination inside the social network that includes play-by-play coverage of sports matches, alongside comments from a user’s Facebook friends, analysts and experts, alongside other game and play information.

“People already turn to Facebook to celebrate, commiserate, and talk trash with their friends and other fans”, Steve Kafka, a Facebook product manager, wrote in a blog statement.

Right now, there’s only one way to access Facebook Sports: by searching for the game in the app. The company says it will soon introduce new ways to find the feature. The third tab shows comments from verified commentators, players, and sports outlets while the final one will contain detailed stats for the event you’re watching. “Now we’ve built a place devoted to sports so you can get the feeling you’re watching the game with your friends even when you aren’t together”. Sport Stadium provides a place to chat about what’s happening with your friends, along with providing live stats and expert insights.

Currently, the feature is being rolled out for American football games to iPhone users in the US.

“We think it can really enhance awareness”.

It’s worth noting that Twitter has been hailed as the flawless medium to date to follow live updates and reactions about live events, sports and other TV broadcasts.

A 2015 report by the Pew Research Center also found that a higher percentage of people who got news from Twitter – about 70 percent – regularly saw posts about sports compared to Facebook.

On Tuesday, Facebook also announced a partnership with Nielsen which will incorporate the site’s user conversation data into Nielsen’s social TV ratings.

Eventually, Facebook plans to utilize its Stadium feature for all professional sporting events, including popular sports outside the United States like cricket.

It seems clear that Facebook Sports Stadium could compete with both of those services.