FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Tech

This Olympics, NBC Has Made Television Irrelevant

No thanks to NBC’s offensively terrible television coverage this time around, to properly experience the Olympics, serious viewers have been forced online. It started with the opening ceremony, which was tape delayed in the East Coast and then again...

No thanks to NBC’s offensively terrible television coverage this time around, to properly experience the Olympics, serious viewers have been forced online. It started with the opening ceremony, which was tape delayed in the East Coast and then again for the West. NBC’s reason was so they could properly “add necessary context” (or simply cutting content, like the musical tribute to the 7/7 terrorist attack) but after six hours, the broadcasters had yet to figure out who Tim Berners-Lee was (you know, that guy who created the World Wide Web). The bloody irony.

Advertisement
Tim Berners-Lee hacking away on a Next computer, courtesy of the late Steve Jobs.

Of course, this wasn’t the first time NBC has been wildly ignorant about technology. But we also know this wasn’t about “context.” This was about maximizing ad revenue dollars during American primetime. It got worse when the games began and the television network started to cherry pick the “hottest” events, like the men’s 400 medley that featured both Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte (the latter taking the gold in impressive fashion, flashing his patriotic bling and perhaps stealing from the former the mantle of swimming’s national posterboy). But if you wanted to experience this emotional event on television at the same time as the rest of the world, you were out of luck. You had to wait at least a few hours until NBC allowed you to catch up after the fact.

Interested TV watchers would also have to tune out the Internet, which is generally impossible since we’re connected in some way at all times. Even casual viewing comes with constant landmines. I flipped to one of the channels Sunday afternoon (the Olympics is playing on NBC and affiliated networks like MSNBC, CNBC and Bravo) to find myself pleasantly stunned by the awesomeness of fencing, or “saber” as it’s called officially. Compelled to dig deeper by the fearsome finesse on display, I googled the American, Daryl Homer who was looking to earn himself a place in the medal games. But along with his bio, I inadvertently glanced the final result. Turns out, it was a taped broadcast. All that emotion and anxiety I felt for this shy kid from the Bronx making an embattled comeback against his wonderfully wild and favored opponent, the Romanian, Rares Dumitrescu immediately vanished. He’d already lost.

Advertisement

In this reality, the trolls aren’t the assholes who post the ending of The Dark Knight in the comments section of PerezHilton.com for kicks, it’s ESPN.com prominently reporting the news (which by the way is fueled in part by a mini-feud between the two over NBC’s 24 hour embargo on event highlights).

Other places, like SBNation (which isn’t beefing with NBC) were careful to adjust their Twitter strategy for those restricted to America’s television bubble, keeping it vague during the actual, non-televised event:

Results for Men’s 100m Breast, where a new WR was set, and an American won a medal -> sbn.to/MUV0HK

— SB Nation (@sbnation) July 29, 2012

Then adding more detailed spoilers once everyone caught up:

Cameron Van der Burgh sets a WR, wins gold, and then just straight chills on the lane divider. sbn.to/T0hyrl

— SB Nation (@sbnation) July 30, 2012

Also, there’s the awkwardness of tweeting real-time about events that already transpired like the thrilling mens 4×100 freestyle relay (hint: the U.S. lost in the final lap):

Lookin’ good for the U.S. so far!

— SB Nation (@sbnation) July 30, 2012

And the inevitable groan-worthy parody account, @NBCDelayed:

BREAKING: Dewey defeats Truman in landslide.

— NBC Delayed (@NBCDelayed) July 30, 2012

CORRECTION: Dewey doesn’t defeat Truman, Truman re-elected President.

— NBC Delayed (@NBCDelayed) July 30, 2012

At least compared to our peers, this is a uniquely American experience. UK residents were treated with over 20 dedicated channels featuring BBC’s exceptional live coverage of all the events with no commercials (the costs are covered by a TV license fee everyone pays) and insightful commentary. Even my friend who recently moved to Canada wasn’t subjugated to this form of quasi-censorship. “I have NBC here,” he said. “But I had to watch it on CTV. I don’t remember what NBC was showing when Phelps and Lochte swam the 400 medley. ESPN was showing some interview with Bela Karolyi (the Romanian gymnastics coach) and the U.S. gymnastics team. Canadian networks showed the race — like a normal network.”

Advertisement

Aggrieved fans are understandably furious, and courtesy the social network boom, fans of this Olympics now have more platforms than ever to vent their anger. Here’s a grab of NBC’s Facebook page (the “Recent Posts” section was removed after I took this screenshot)

Then, there’s Twitter:

And so by focusing on the money a little too much and the sports not enough, NBC has made television completely irrelevant for this Olympics. All serious viewers have taken to the internet and not necessarily by choice. In fact, one of the only reasons I still pay for cable television is live sports. Luckily I do, because you can only access NBC’s online streams if you’re a cable customer putting me in the unenviable position of paying for TV just so I can use the internet.

To their credit, NBC does offer all of the events live online (and also an official Youtube channel), but getting it to work has been hit or miss, although the 15-30 second advertisements seem to perform flawlessly (to to add insult to injury, tons of buffering, when it works at all).

That the Internet viewing experience is shoddy by any standards isn’t that surprising when the guys selling me the much more profitable television feed (Time Warner Cable) is also my ISP. Internet coverage certainly isn’t the priority here (and to think, NBC almost merged with Comcast).

Subsequently, in order to achieve the most authentic viewing experience, many have taken to piracy — like the ones who wanted to see Danny Boyle’s exquisitely produced opening ceremony when it actually happened, bereft of NBC’s often redundant ramblings, over-commentary and constant commercial breaks — using streams or proxy services to access the acclaimed BBC coverage, tactics generally reserved for crafty citizens of mainland China. Once again, the best option is regrettably illegal.

Advertisement

Which pretty much makes it official: the internet is really the only place to watch the Olympics. For such an international event, with so many games and overlapping narratives, maybe television as a format never really had a chance. Where else can you have it all in front of you, the context, the scores, the schedules — all of the events live? And where else can you get the incredible, unique perspectives, like this video from a wily performer that snuck a hidden camera into the opening ceremony?

Just like it’s happening for the news, the internet is fast becoming the go-to destination for live sports. In Europe, where online gambling is already legal, this may already be the case. With many things internet, vices like porn and piracy are typically technological first movers. There, gambling sites like bet365.com — which cater to sporting aficionados willing to back up their nous with cold hard cash — offer the most complete coverage of live sports all year round. For fans of sports like tennis, which don’t always get the same respect from TV for smaller events outside the majors, this sort of access becomes essential.

But by making the Olympics completely unwatchable on TV, NBC is only accelerating the process (and perhaps their own demise). Much of this was a repeat of Beijing, which was also plagued by tape-delays, but four years later in a world post-Facebook IPO, we simply expect so much more. It could have been a wonderful opportunity to marry the two mediums, complementing the dynamic power of the Internet with the entrenchment of TV. Instead the two are completely at odds.

Which is really a damn shame because TV and remains the most accessible medium for the majority of people. Now they’ll have to miss out or at least get a watered down version of this international celebration of human achievement because one company refuses to fully embrace the 21st century for no other reason than dollars and cents and along the way, undermined the very spirit of the games.

Follow Alec on Twitter: @sfnuop.

Connections: