It’s time again for the biggest sporting event of the world. If you live in the United States, the way to watch the games is on ESPN/ABC, with 52 out of the 64 games on ESPN (see World Cup TV schedule).

The event is taking place in South Africa, meaning most of the games will happen during office hours. Wouldn’t it be amazing if you could watch all games online, and not miss any of the action? Well, this year it’s reality with ESPN3.com. ESPN3.com is ESPN’s relaunched online channel empowered by the Flash Platform.

The player experience is truly amazing. Let’s look at some of the features:

Live statistics, chat, social media, e-commerce
While watching the world cup games you can interact with other viewers via the chat, and follow other events through live statistics. It also includes full Facebook status update integration, featured events, 2010 Soccer Pick’em, milestones, and the ESPN Shop.

Live Dynamic Streaming, live close captioning, and multiple language versions
Adaptive bitrate empowered by FMS 3.5 Live Dynamic Streaming ensures the optimal video quality based on your available bandwidth and performance. In addition advanced features you rarely see in live events include live close captioning, and the ability to select your language track to follow your team in the original language.

Picture-in-Picture and Multi-View
ESPN3.com has a packed live schedule, which most likely will result in the need to watch games in parallel. No problem for the ESPN3.com player, it supports picture-in-picture …

.. and the ability to watch multiple games simultaneously.

Real-time highlights with highlight markers
World cup games are exciting to watch, but important events like goals are spread out over time, and you really don’t want to use DVR to search for important scenes while missing some of the live action. ESPN3.com has the perfect solution, live markers with instant highlights.

During the game markers will become available with highlights, making it possible to watch the highlights while continuing to experience the game.

Summary
It’s certainly a 2010 live experience with an amazing feature set, all build with Flash Builder 4 and based on the Open Source Media Framework. The ESPN3.com experience of the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa is laying the foundation to make it one of the most exciting live events in history.

Go for the cup, Germany!

Visit ESPN3.com to watch the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa.

About the author

Jens Loeffler
Technology enthusiast and evangelist, with a passion for online video and mobile. Senior technical evangelist on Adobe's Media Solutions product management team focusing on online video and services. The views expressed on this blog are personal views.

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