Fans all over the world have always proudly waved their club's scarf during every football match. I still get shivers thinking about the "scarves" of my Napoli, or the crazy ones of San Siro. And the Kop curve of Liverpool fans? And Bayern Munich's Curva Sud, Barça's Gol Sur? Enough, they are all beautiful, the passionate, sporting and sincere support is one of the things we must carry with us into the future.
This is what Manchester City must have thought, collaborating with none other than Cisco to bring the "perfect symbol" of diehard fans into the new century. The target? Create a “smart scarf” that monitors the emotional states of fans during the match.
A scarf that reads passion?
“Being a truly enthusiastic fan is physiological. It has nothing to do with the number of games you attend or where in the world you are. It's what unites us as a group, and now we have the evidence to back it up,” he says Chintan Patel, Chief Technology Officer of Cisco UK & Ireland.
The London club recruited six long-term fans to take part in a pilot study which observed them numerous times for more than 90 minutes of a football match. In this time, the technicians captured more than 120 “states” of happiness, anxiety, tension, excitement and the entire range of emotions experienced during the match.
How did a scarf “learn” to read emotions? You can imagine it, if you are readers of this site. The magic word is always the same: sensors. One in particular, on the neck, records a fan's signals throughout the match: heart rate, body temperature and stress.
Yes, but what's the use?
Thanks to this information, the “Connected Scarf” (that's what they called it) can be used to manage and personalize fan experiences. Manchester City says the project will go "beyond data" and become a "global study of shared passion" for football fans around the world. Ok. However, I have not yet understood this new example of smart fabrics what will it do.
“A scarf it is an iconic item that football fans all over the world own and wear to show their passion and support, and this latest activity with Cisco is an innovative and new way to bring fans together and connect with them in a new and exciting way " .
Nuria Tarré, Chief Marketing & Fan Experience Officer of City Football Group.
The high-tech scarf will be made available to “Citizens” fans both in the stadium and around the world starting next season. Although it remains to be seen whether fans will be as keen to track their emotions during particularly intense matches. Fortunately, the scarf does not register the insults.