A score bug is a

digital on-screen graphic A digital on-screen graphic, digitally originated graphic (DOG, bug, network bug, or screenbug) is a watermark-like station logo that most television broadcasters overlay over a portion of the screen area of their programs to identify the channel ...

which is displayed at either the top or

lower third In the television industry, a lower third is a graphic overlay placed in the title-safe lower area of the screen, though not necessarily the entire lower third of it, as the name suggests. In its simplest form, a lower third can just be tex ...

bottom of the television screen during a broadcast of a sporting event in order to display the current score and other statistics.

History

The concept of a persistent score bug for

association football Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

matches was devised by

Sky Sports Sky Sports is a group of British broadcasting of sports events, subscription sports channels operated by the satellite television, satellite pay television company Sky Group (a division of Comcast), and is the dominant subscription television ...

head David Hill, who was dissatisfied over having to wait to see what the score was after tuning into a match in-progress. The score bug was introduced during Sky's coverage of the then newly-formed English

Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...

in August 1992. Hill's boss repeatedly demanded that the graphic be removed, describing it as the "stupidest thing ehad ever seen". Hill defied the boss's demands and kept the graphic in place. ITV introduced a score bug at the start of the 1993–94 football season, and the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

introduced a score bug towards the end of 1993. The concept was introduced to the United States by

ABC Sports ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Broadcasting * Aliw Broadcasting Corporation, Philippine broadcast company * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial America ...

and

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

during coverage of the

1994 FIFA World Cup The 1994 FIFA World Cup was the 15th FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national soccer teams. It was hosted by the United States and took place from June 17 to July 17, 1994, at nine venues across the country. The United States w ...

. Their justification for the graphic was to provide a location for a rotating series of sponsor logos, in order to allow matches to air without commercial interruption. With the acquisition of rights to the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a Professional gridiron football, professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National ...

(NFL) by

BSkyB Sky UK Limited (formerly British Sky Broadcasting Limited (BSkyB)), trading as Sky, is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television, broadband internet, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers ...

's American sibling Fox (a fellow venture of

Rupert Murdoch Keith Rupert Murdoch ( ; born 11 March 1931) is an Australian - American retired business magnate, investor, and media mogul. Through his company News Corp, he is the owner of hundreds of List of assets owned by News Corp, local, national, a ...

), Hill became the first president of

Fox Sports Fox Sports is the brand name for a number of sports channels, broadcast divisions, programming, and other media around the world. The name originates from Fox Broadcasting Company in the United States, which in turn derives its name from Fox Fi ...

. Under Hill's leadership, Fox introduced version of the score bug branded as the "Fox Box", which was part of its inaugural season of NFL coverage in

1994 The year 1994 was designated as the " International Year of the Family" and the "International Year of Sport and the Olympic Ideal" by the United Nations. In the Line Islands and Phoenix Islands of Kiribati, 1994 had only 364 days, omitti ...

. '' Variety'' criticized it as an "annoying see-through clock and score graphic" and expressed concern for people "who actually watched the beginning of the game and would rather have their screen clear of graphics". Hill even received a death threat from an irate viewer, with a specific emphasis on him being a "foreigner", but the score bug soon became a ubiquitous feature for American football broadcasts, along with almost all American sports broadcasts in the years that followed. Dick Ebersol of

NBC Sports NBC Sports is an American programming division for NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, that is responsible for sports broadcasts on their broadcast network NBC, the Cable television, cable channels NBC owns, and on Peacock (streaming service) ...

initially opposed the idea of a score bug, as he thought that fans would dislike seeing more graphics on the screen and would change the channel from blowout games if the score was constantly being displayed. Since the 2010s, the on-air design and positioning of some score bugs have been influenced by the needs of

Internet video Internet video (also known as online video) is digital video that is distributed over the internet. Internet video exists in several formats, the most notable being MPEG-4i AVC, AVCHD, FLV, and MP4. There are several online video hosting s ...

(especially when viewing an event on devices with smaller screens), including bugs noticeably larger than prior iterations designed with television viewing in mind, and Fox having adopted a score bug positioned in the bottom-center of the screen for football (easing the ability for the bug to remain visible when highlights are cropped for square videos posted on social media).

References

{{Broadcasting Computer graphics Film and video technology Sports television technology Television terminology Scoring (sport)

History

See also

References