Why is the race happening?
How do people take part?
And how does the race actually take place?
Why would I want to host the race?
Technically, what do I need to do and how’s this built?
How do I know it’s installed properly?
What if it gets annoying?
What do I do after the race has finished

• Why is the race happening?

  To celebrate the launch of Orange’s Animals packages to their Pay As You Go customers.

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• How do people take part?

  They sign up for a balloon at http://www.playballoonacy.com. On June 23rd the balloons will be released, and then race across the internet.

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• And how does the race actually take place?

  The balloons will fly across a range of sites, picking up speed & distance bonuses as they fly. They can also pick up tokens for entry in to free prize draws.

  There are already a bunch of sites signed up to support the race, including The Sun and Yahoo. We hope that you’ll host the race too.

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• Why would I want to host the race?

  If you want to get your site in front of an audience of 16-24 year olds then for a week then you’ll have the chance as they fly through. There should be loads of people taking part, as the grand prize is a week-long luxury for the winner and a group of mates in Ibiza.

  Also, you’d be taking part in a World’s First. And that’s not something you get to do everyday.

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• Technically, what do I need to do and how’s this built?

  You’ll need to submit the URLs where you want the race to appear, which you can do at http://www.playballoonacy.com.

  We’ll give you a short piece of code that you’ll need to add to your site. Before you can host the race we’ll check your site to make sure there’s nothing rude or inappropriate (like gambling) on there. You can check on the site to see the status of your sites.

  The code is a short piece of Javascript that will call a Flash 9 movie. It’s this Flash movie that’ll display the race - it’ll be called from our server. If a visitor to your site doesn’t have Flash 9 they be prompted to upgrade via the Express Upgrade.

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• How do I know it’s installed properly?

  Once you’ve added the code a small image of a balloon should appear on your site. Click this and you’ll be directed to a page that says you’re hosting the race. When the race launches this page will be replace automatically with the race overlay.

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• What if it gets annoying?

  Users control if they want to see, minimise or ignore the race. These settings travel from site-to-site, so we’ve given them as much control as possible.

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• What do I do after the race has finished

  The race finishes on June 30th. From July 1st you can remove the Javascript from your site with no impact on the race.

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