The Distribution of Audiovisual Transmission of the 2018 World Cup from the Brazilian Perspective

Abstract

The FIFA World Cup completely interrupts the Brazilian society’s daily life, as this reason dominates and emerges strong emotions, thus making watching the game with the national team an essential act of media communication. This study thus describes and analyzes the distribution of content originating from the transmission of a soccer game from the 2018 FIFA World Cup offered by Brazilian television networks that hold the license for the event’s broadcasting rights, either in the programing strip of television channels or on the Internet through web applications. To do so, Yin’s delimited multiple case study method was employed. The study results revealed that the three licensed Brazilian television networks distributed the transmission through 14 different configurations between television broadcasts and the Internet. Further, we argue that while the idea of productive chain proposed by the institution responsible for the event (FIFA) seeks to unify sports television broadcasting worldwide, in practice, it suffers interference from national aspects in distribution. For this reason, it is vital to produce the event broadcast to distribute it worldwide. This is the responsibility of the national channels licensed by FIFA, as they adapt the broadcasts to regional and local variations in political, technical, and social issues.