Data visualizations for sports events prepared by fans. Communicative implications in the context of FIFA World Cup 2018

This article addresses the appropriation of data visualization technologies by fans of both technology and sports in the representation of massive sports events. This approach aims to identify particular aspects of this appropriation through a methodological analysis of features inscribed in the visual text. We studied three cases that took place in the 2018 FIFA World Cup with the perspective of visual text analysis. In the study, we took into account contextual dimensions such as the contemporary production of data visualization, the social differentiation between spectators and athletes, and the forms of validation of fanaticism in culture's framework. The results show the technological appropriation in the utterance around sport, the sense of sport inscribed in the interface, the construction of the receiver model, and the participation inside fan's community. Finally, conclusions ponder data visualizations made by fans as a parallel communicative mechanism, making up communal relationships, and that would give rise to the convergence of multiple anxieties beyond sports.