The 2022 FIFA World Cup is an international association football tournament contested by the men's national teams of FIFA's member associations. The event is taking place in Qatar from 20 November to 18 December 2022. This is the first World Cup to be held in the Arab world, and the second World Cup held entirely in Asia after the 2002 tournament in South Korea and Japan. It will be played in a reduced timeframe of 29 days. The opening match was between Qatar and Ecuador at Al Bayt Stadium, Al Khor. In its first ever World Cup appearance, Qatar lost 2--0, becoming the first host nation to lose its opening game. The final will be held on 18 December 2022, coinciding with Qatar's National Day.
How Social Media Changed The World Cup Experience
Four years ago, social media was just beginning to take off around the World Cup. Facebook was an established presence, and many people were beginning to catch on to the new real-time conversation network Twitter. The 2010 FIFA World Cup broke records for online engagement in many formats. However, as social media goes, the 2014 FIFA World Cup looks to once again be digital history in the making. In fact, in just two days the 2014 FIFA World Cup saw more traffic on Twitter and Facebook than through the entire duration of the 2010 tournament. ESPN will be broadcasting all 64 matches online for the first time ever and many companies are expecting to spend more on social media marketing than they are for any other medium.
Twitter and Facebook have both ramped up features in anticipation of the large volume of activity on both respective platforms. Twitter unleashed a "starter kit" with options to change your profile and cover photos, as well as follow several relevant accounts to fill your timeline with important news and updates. Hashflags have also become a popular item, attaching the nation's flag to the particular three letter moniker for each country represented in the World Cup (#BRAZIL, for example).
So what does this mean? B2C and B2B Brand presence on social media during the next couple of months is more important than ever. There is a huge opportunity for many companies to engage with potential customers. One unique quality of the World Cup is that it is a globally unifying experience. The World Cup is the only time  fans from all over the world drop what they're doing and join in on a singular conversation. Tying your brand into that experience should be the goal of any business. With more eyes following the action on more platforms than ever before, putting the right content in the right place has become paramount.Â
Host selection criticism
The choice to host the World Cup in Qatar has been the source of substantive controversy in the Western World. These include criticisms of Qatar's human rights record, especially their treatment of migrant workers and position on LGBT issues, among other things; leading to allegations of sportswashing. Others have said Qatar's intense climate and lack of a strong football culture is evidence of bribery for hosting rights and wider FIFA corruption. Boycotts of the event are planned by several countries, clubs and individual players, and former FIFA President Sepp Blatter has twice said that giving Qatar hosting rights was a "mistake". FIFA chief Gianni Infantino has defended Qatar and accused the Western World of hypocrisy on the matter, labeling it "profoundly unjust" and "for what we Europeans have been doing around the world for the last 3,000 years, we should be apologizing for the next 3,000 years, before starting to give moral lessons.
There have been allegations of bribery and corruption in the selection process involving FIFA's executive committee members. These allegations are being investigated by FIFA. In May 2011, allegations of corruption within the FIFA senior officials raised questions over the legitimacy of the World Cup 2022 being held in Qatar. The accusations of corruption have been made relating to how Qatar won the right to host the event. A FIFA internal investigation and report cleared Qatar of any violation, but chief investigator Michael J. Garcia has since described FIFA's report on his enquiry as containing "numerous materially incomplete and erroneous representations."
In May 2015, Swiss federal prosecutors opened an investigation into corruption and money laundering related to the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bids. In August 2018, former FIFA president Sepp Blatter claimed that Qatar had used "black ops", suggesting that the bid committee had cheated to win the hosting rights. Some investigations found that Qatar sought an edge in securing hosting by hiring a former CIA officer turned private contractor, Kevin Chalker, to spy on rival bid teams and key football officials who picked the winner in 2010.
In September 2018, a delegation from al-Ghufran tribe lodged a complaint to FIFA's President to reject the establishment of the World Cup in Qatar unless its government restored the Qatari nationality to all those affected from the tribe and returned land allegedly stolen from them to build the sport facilities.
This has caused a lot of debate on social media, because if we look at the various cases that have occurred in Qatar. Supposedly, Qatar cannot host the 2022 world cup.Â
