Internet winning over World Cup viewers

Concerns that staff would spend much of the World Cup watching streams of live games sat at their desks, rather than working, appear to have been a little premature with a poll conducted by silicon.com finding that most employees favour less distracting methods of keeping up with matches.

A survey of silicon.com readers found only 10 per cent are keeping up with games by watching live streams on the internet while in the office. The most popular way for people to keep up with matches was to check the internet for news updates.

Better news for bosses was that 31 per cent of respondents who said they have better things to do than keep up with the football, while just one per cent said it was more than their job's worth to be caught keeping an eye on the World Cup.

Televisions appear to have found their way into many workplaces with 12 per cent of respondents saying they are following games on the TV, while five per cent rely upon the radio.

A modest three per cent of respondents said they rely upon word of mouth - possibly listening for the oohs and aahs from their colleagues following the game more closely.

No respondents to the survey said they use mobile phone alerts, which is perhaps unsurprising given separate research out today that revealed many alert services offered by UK operators are failing miserably to keep fans in touch with what's happening on the pitches in Germany.

Many took more than four minutes to alert users to Peter Crouch's opening goal for England last night and the match had finished before some users received news of Steve Gerrard's wonder-strike.

Argogroup, which conducted the research, claims the worst performer was Vodafone which it claims sent out starting line-ups for one match a full 44 minutes after kick-off.