I did it! Last weekend we went up North to Vancouver B.C. to be part of the Olympics.
Of course, I’ve been talking about this since weeks now, have been following every event and cheering for every medal. So this Saturday, with the sky so blue and the sun so lovely I did the most crazy thing I’ve done in awhile. I spontanously packed up the family and drove to Vancouver B.C.
Well, here is how I did it.
We left Saturday evening, I closed the store at 6pm and including a trip to McD for fries for the Kiddies we were on the I-5 just after 7pm – that surely is a new record, considering that we had two Kids to pack up! Read the rest of this entry »
Okay, I am obsessed with the Olympics. If you follow my twitter feed you probably knew that already. If you’re a friend on facebook you probably can’t stand it anymore, but I have to continue on this rant. I love the Olympics. But the NBC’s coverage is horrible, horrible disapointing. I will take a stop watch in the next couple of evenings and actually calculate what the percentage is of commercials to actual coverage for the games.
Sure, NBC’s big excuse is that they said they’re loosing $200mio on this event. Did they bid too high? Or are their announcers salaries too bloated?
Here is a great article from SI’s Michael Rosenberg, another “old boy media guy” who’s trying to defend and explain what NBC does. And save his own job and salary.
He starts of by making this entertaining comments:
Is there anything more frustrating for a sports fan than watching the Olympics? Every night I feel like I’m sitting down with a great book, and after I read the first 10 pages, I discover that pages 11 to 25 have been crossed out, and then I’m supposed to skip to page 102, and by the way, I inadvertently read the ending nine hours ago.
And then continues:
If you want NBC’s coverage to seem suspenseful — if you want, in other words, to feel like a sports fan — then you have to build a tiny brick house, then take the last brick and hit yourself over the head until you’re unconscious.
(I’m updating this article as the games progress and I get more ideas…)
“The media landscape is changing” is an, by now, already old hat. People and businesses are learning to adjust, can the Olympics too?
(I’m surprised @garyvee hasn’t weight in on that, since he was all over the Superbowl and its advertisers. Gary, where are you??)
Anyway, NBC is the exclusive media outlet for the Olympics in the US. Their choices on what to show when and where is a whole different story. Just watch the wrath on twitter unfold as NBC continues it’s tradition of trying to trick us into believing that every event and important decision happens in 7 minute increments “live” in prime time, perfectly nestled among thousands and thousands of commercials over and over again for the same products and brands.
The Olympics happen in one time zone, might be weather delayed and happen all day, live. The IOC needs to figure out how they want their brand to be represented and reported on.
