As a Canadian my enjoyment of most Super Bowls is limited to the game it self, as we are generally limited to watching 4 or 5 terrible ads over and over and over. The prime example last night, a made for TV movie about 4 RCMP officers that were tragically killed on an Alberta farm. (Which seemed like a rather dark and sad thing to be promoting during the super bowl).

However, With the advent of YouTube, Dailymotion and other video sharing sites over that past few years it has allowed Canadians to enjoy all of the greatness of Super Bowl ads. As I was watching the game this year I was amazed that numerous times during the game Fox was actually promoting the fact that all of the Super Bowl ads would be available after the game at MySpace.com/superbowlads. This is great, you can go and watch all of the ads CTV kindly blocked and they are nicely listed by the quarter in which they aired.

My real problem with the Super Bowl, specifically this year as I am a Pats fan, is that the same social media tools that enabled me to watch all of the ads I missed also will continue to add to my misery for days to come. Let’s just say I am not very happy with the outcome of the game, I didn’t watch the last 10sec, or any Sports Centre this morning in an effort to keep all Super Bowl related news at bay. The problem for a downtrodden fan like myself is that web 2.0 technologies are so pervasive its impossible to escape news these days. Facebook updates, RSS feeds, YouTube, Digg, SMS messages from friends who may have won copious amounts of money on the outcome, everywhere I turn I am reminded of the terrible tragedy that took place yesterday.

Thankfully cars.com created some great ads for the Super Bowl that helped take a little bit of the sting away (my favorite ad is below).

Perhaps in time social media also will provide me with some therapy, like this YouTube video that was created to help Cowboys fans overcome their disappointing season.