This is a guest blog from Akamai. For more information, visit www.akamai.com/
There is no singular sporting event that captures the world's attention quite like the Olympics. And there is enough data to show that the 2012 Olympic Games attracted the largest aggregate online audience ever for a sporting competition.
Of course, with an event that spans more than two weeks with hundreds of competitions from athletes from all corners of the globe, it is no wonder that total online viewership would break records.
Add the fact that there are more devices and means for consuming sports and entertainment than ever before - with the tablet increasingly finding a spot as a second screen while watching TV - and we can all comfortably surmise that the London Games were experienced by more people than any preceding Olympics in history.
On Akamai's global platform alone, we delivered more than one billion aggregate video views (a milestone we believed possible before the games started). We saw a staggering increase in mobile video traffic for an online event. And when all was said and done after the Closing Ceremonies in London, Akamai had delivered almost double the amount of total traffic for a one-time event over a record we set two years ago.
Looking at total traffic served for the recent Olympics another way; Akamai delivered the equivalent of approximately 9,500 years of video in just two weeks.
We collaborated with nearly every major broadcaster in the world - 22 in all - that had acquired the rights to stream the Games online.