Today we visited Eurosport. Essentially the equivalent of ESPN except Eurosport is responsible for broadcasting to 54 different countries, in 22 languages. It was incredible to see the way they manage all of that. By far the most impressive part of the experience was learning how they run such a massive operation. They record the video and the natural sounds (crowd noises, on field/court noise) and then mix it with the commentary of the 22 different commentators. They then take all of that and send it off to the viewers all around the region.
The culture is geared towards a European audience. We learned that the appearance of American football, basketball, baseball, and hockey is rare on their channel. Instead, they are heavily focused on tennis, cycling, and futbol (soccer). The Olympics are another large event that Eurosport has the responsibility of covering.
Eurosport seems to have a firm grasp of their business. They know what their audience wants to see, but they’re open to innovation. It’s clear that with the constantly changing technology, Eurosport will change as well. By doing so they have cemented their place as the largest broadcaster of sports in the entire continent.
