On Sunday, Germany beat out Argentina -- with a goal by Mario Goetze in overtime -- bringing the 2014 World Cup in Brazil to a close for players, spectators and worldwide fans participating in the event via social media.
Facebook and Twitter played a large role in experiencing the World Cup, providing immediate reactions to crushing defeats, incredible saves and notorious teeth action. (Twitter even had special World Cup features.) And unlike the Superbowl, NBA finals or other predominantly American sporting events, reaction to the World Cup was just that: global.
Several folks responded to this world-wide sporting spectacle with renditions of viewers simultaneously participating in this event via social media.
One of those came from a collaboration between author and artist Teju Cole, digital artist Jer Thorp and and artist Mario Klingemann. It is called Time of the Game, and was discussed by Cole on Twitter on July 8.
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Viewers took photos at an exact minute of a game, and then sent the photo and caption to Cole. The result, found here, is stunning to see — all the layered photos of people from around the world, watching the same game at the same second.
Another visualization shows the explosion of tweets during the final. According to Recode, the game generated 32.1 million tweets (which is still short of the 35.6 million tweets generated when Germany crushed Brazil). According to a map made by Twitter, here's what the world, in tweets, looked like when Germany scored during the final:
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