22 FLEXIBLE, VERSATILE, RESILIENT | MEDIA talk
NEW VIRTUAL WORLDS
With live events on hold, some events organisers found virtual routes to keep their audience engaged. Cannes Film Festival launched on online portal through which it was able to hold screenings for buyers and media in place of the usual live screenings and surrounding festivities; Glastonbury held a virtual festival airing performances from past events; and Formula One, owned by Liberty Media, held a virtual Grand Prix series after cancelling the opening of its season. The latter brought together Formula One drivers, professional athletes from other fields, musicians and professional gamers to compete in races during lockdown. Over the period, the series achieved an impressive 30 million views across TV and digital platforms demonstrating not only the loyalty of Formula One fans, but also the growing popularity of e-sports. The e-sports market is forecast to be valued around USD $1 billion in 2020.
With traditional fans turning to e-sports while their favoured sport remained side- lined one by-product could be a faster rate of normalisation for the virtual alternative. But e-sports is only a tiny fraction of the market. According to the World Economic Forum, the global gaming market is estimated to be worth approximately USD $159 billion this year, dwarfing the revenue made from box office sales or music revenues. The spread of this revenue is not geographically even, with the Asia-Pacific making up for roughly half of all gaming revenue and the US making up another quarter, but other markets are growing. In the UK Computer games and consoles were amongst the few contributors to a marginal increase in inflation in June.
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