+

Cookies on the Business Insider India website

Business Insider India has updated its Privacy and Cookie policy. We use cookies to ensure that we give you the better experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we\'ll assume that you are happy to receive all cookies on the Business Insider India website. However, you can change your cookie setting at any time by clicking on our Cookie Policy at any time. You can also see our Privacy Policy.

Close
HomeQuizzoneWhatsappShare Flash Reads
 

Facebook launched a new section of its app that's all about sports

Jan 21, 2016, 14:39 IST

Kyle Terada/USA TODAY Sports

Facebook has launched Sport Stadium, a hub within the main app that lets sports fans talk about big games, news, and other sports-related things.

Advertisement

According to Facebook, there are more than 650 million sports fans who use the service (out of a total 1.2 billion). The new hub moves all the sports-related chatter into one place, including posts from friends, live scores and stats, commentary from experts, and information about where to find games.

Facebook does not have a launch partner, but is licensing data from a company called Sportsradar, according to Re/Code.

"[It's a complement] to the television experience and even the in-game experience," Dan Read, Facebook's head of sports partnerships, told Re/Code. "It provides information about the game, but it also provides you that vital conversation and interaction around the game which we think is really critical to consuming live sports."

It's unclear what kind of games, beyond the NFL, are available to talk about. According to Re/Code, the company is looking at adding cricket coverage.

Advertisement

One of the key aims of Facebook's new sporting efforts could be to take on Twitter, which is still one of the most popular ways to talk about live events, such as sports matches.

During the Super Bowl, Twitter saw a record 28.4 million tweets during the game, up from 24.9 million the previous years. At one point during the game, over 375,000 tweets were being sent per minute.

Twitter recently launched Moments, which collects tweets about an event into one place, and can be used to "report" on sporting events as they happen. Facebook's new Sports Stadium could be seen as a response to that.

NOW WATCH: An Italian yacht company has built a shape-shifting speedboat that looks like something out of 'Transformers'

Please enable Javascript to watch this video
You are subscribed to notifications!
Looks like you've blocked notifications!
Next Article