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A comment on The greatest juggler alive quit to open a construction business. Parent comment

Re:The greatest juggler alive quit to open a construction bu... by zem on Wednesday April 30, 2014 @04:17AM (#7672157)
that's pretty american-centric. as an indian i'd say ali was truly world-famous, jordan is well known to my generation due to nba catching on in the 80s but i'm betting a large chunk of my parent's generation wouldn't know him, i only knew about babe ruth from reading american fiction, and i'd pretty much never heard of gretzky until last year.
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Re:The greatest juggler alive quit to open a construction bu... by clarky07 on Wednesday April 30, 2014 @11:45PM (#7678096)
so you have in fact heard of all of them. I think that pretty much proves my point, but I could also throw Pele in there for a non american that is far far more well known than Mr. Bradman.
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Re:The greatest juggler alive quit to open a construction bu... by adventured on Wednesday April 30, 2014 @06:35AM (#7672489)
It's obviously American centric because American media has been dominate at a global level for decades. That's the reason so many people know who eg Tiger Woods and Jordan are: American media made them famous to a degree far exceeding their accomplishments. The same holds true in music, movies, tv shows, and so on.

Jordan was widely regarded as one of the most famous people on earth for 15 or 20 years. His name is even more famous than his picture. I don't think there's much debate to be had about his global fame frankly. As basketball globalized rapidly in the late 80's / early 90's, it was his image intertwined with it, and it perfectly coincided with the rise of global media.

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Re:The greatest juggler alive quit to open a construction bu... by anigbrowl on Wednesday April 30, 2014 @03:10PM (#7675611)
It's got more to do with the audience for the sport. Golf is played all over the world. On the other hand, a famous American Football quarterback could travel incognito in most of the world, because the international audience for American football is tiny by comparison.
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