NBC's broken Olympic coverage
npr.org
npr.org
So, here's an idea: why not let others (even competitors) bid on individual events. This could work from either the IOC doing to brokering or even NBC itself.
So, for example, if another network wanted to broadcast the USA/Canada hockey game, they could have bid for the rights to show either that game, or all of hockey. I'm sure that would be worth something. Why should a large part of the country have to miss out on a great event, just because NBC decided to show ice dancing?
Split the games up into smaller biddable packages, and I'm sure you'd end up with as much, if not more, revenue for the IOC, and more people could get to see a greater variety of events. Imagine if ABC/CBS/NBC/Fox/ESPN were all showing a part of the Olympics? Wouldn't this be more in the spirit? You'd get a greater variety of events and more depth in individual events.
Seems like the IOC would benefit from licensing to all the different networks, the networks would all benefit from being able to carry the olympics, and the people would benefit from the competition between the networks to provide better replays/commentary/analysis.
Other than 'backstage' interviews, I suspect most footage is shot by IOC crews.
There's an IOC subsidiary called Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS), which has crews/cameras/directors at every session of every event. If you're watching an event happen (as opposed to an interview), there's a 99% chance it's coming from an OBS camera. If the shot is coming from a site-specific camera - like the track-side camera at speedskating or the overhead curling shots - it is coming from an OBS camera. OBS cameras are the only ones allowed to go into the field of play; all other cameras have to stay on specified media risers outside the competition area.
When you watch an event on CTV, you're actually watching the OBS feed (with OBS graphics) overlaid with a CTV-supplied commentary track - the only sound OBS supplies is the ambient environmental ones, and it doesn't cut to any interviews or anything. Those of you who watched the Beijing Olympics on the CBC website may recall that there were eight or nine feeds available, but only one of which had CBC commentary. The commentary-free ones (which also didn't have commercial breaks or explanations) were the raw OBS feeds, without any additional CBC editing/directing.
When a broadcaster pays for exclusive national rights to the Olympics, one of the main things they're paying for is exclusive access to the OBS feeds. As for why they don't sell that feed to multiple networks? I assume they've worked the math and determined that they'll make more money by selling it exclusively, as opposed to cooperatively.
But if they went and looked at economic theory they would find that the expected price of a bundle is always less than the sum of the prices of the individual things that are part of that bundle. So theory says that selling things piecemeal should result in more revenue.
In the case of the Olympics you would do that by selling off sports one by one. If NBC values speed skating and skiing, let them have it. If CBS wants hockey, let them have it. If ESPN is willing to buy biathlon, let them have it. Any sports not purchased wholesale can be negotiated during the Olympics. So if nobody buys bobsleigh but an interesting story there happens, they sell the story just like any other story of interest gets sold.
A lot of paperwork, and a shift in mindset, but they should get more money that way. And interested viewers would get better coverage of a broader range of sports.
This also goes for viewers though. If in order to watch the 4 events that I want I have to buy 2 separate bundles then the bundled price of those 4 events, for me, is greater.
However in practice consumers do not want the hassle and prefer bundles. Vendors like bundles as well because they provide a convenient way to get people to try things they wouldn't otherwise try.
However in this case bundle versus piecemeal is not the appropriate comparison. The problem now is that one vendor buys the entire feed, and then doesn't offer all of it. If it was sold piecemeal to different vendors, then you'd have the option of watching everything, including things like hockey that are not currently being shown. And for avid sport watchers the extra cost is nothing for the simple reason that you probably have already purchased a bundle from the cable company that gives you most of the likely channels on which things you want will be there. The result then for the end consumer is that the Olympics are on more channels with greater variety, and therefore people will get to watch more of what they want. The additional people in the seats will result in more eyes for advertiser dollars, and everyone is happier.
Incidentally there is an interesting fact about selling services piecemeal versus bundling. If two vendors compete in the same market with those strategies economic theory predicts a nasty price war until one is driven out. See http://www.dtc.umn.edu/~odlyzko/doc/price.war.pdf for the gory details.
Did you know for example that they have a channel called Universal sports that is owned by NBC and that is an over the air and cable channel that broadcasts nothing but sports. You would think that would be the perfect place to broadcast the olympic games. You know what they broadcast? They broadcast winter sports, but not the olympics. Instead, they have replays of winter sports events that happened months ago. So for example, while the men's downhill was happening and it was not being broadcast live by any NBC channel, that universal sports channel was showing an old replay of another men's downhill that was not an olympic event (it was part of the world cup circuit and happened several months ago). While the US women hockey team was playing without being broadcast anywhere, the universal sports channel was broadcasting a fricking documentary about the US women's hockey team.
I mean it is as if they intentionally want to piss me off.
Oh and dont get me started on primetime. First of all they take up half an hour of prime time coverage with a show that is about the olympics but does not feature any olympic sports. Instead it is a freaking infomercial about Vancouver and british columbia, and various random products, restaurants, that may have a minor connection to the olympics. So NBC is broadcasting infomercials in prime time that is how far they have fallen.
The actual sports coverage is so badly presented that you always know who is going to win the race before hand. That is because the idiot commentators are not commenting live, they know what happened and they just keep talking about the people that they know are going to win. And they usually put in a human interest story about the athlete that is about to win. So why watch the race?
Here is a piece of advice to nbc execs -- the main reason I watch sports at all is because sports are NOT predictable.
So yes, in general it is not surprising at all that these are the same TV execs that thought up the entire Leno Connan fiasco.
I didn't get to see the hockey game though.
In this particular case especially it's hard to object to a torrent. It sounds like he buys TV, and there are just some gaps in the coverage offered, and he'd only be using torrents to help fill in the gaps. What harm does that do?
It being really cold and my being a poor college student, I decided to just resign myself to my fate and asked my dad to send me score updates via text.
The scores were inspiring enough-- we were keeping pace with the Canadians in hockey. But then Dad starts throwing in extras like "they're wearing 1980 throwback uniforms," "our goalie is having the game of his life," "huge fight at the end of the 2nd." Fuck fuck fuck. How am I missing this? Then he drops the bomb: "This is the best game I've seen since 1980." Fuuuuck!
Right then in the middle of watching Family Guy on Fox with everyone else, on Taco Night of all nights, I just jumped up, explained I couldn't just sit there, and left. I powerwalked down to the near-campus area and walked up and down the street till I found somewhere with the game on (which took a long while) and-- no joke-- stood outside in the freezing cold on the phone with my dad through the entirety of the third.
Christ, it was so worth it.
This was done to such a degree during the last FIFA world cup that I chose to watch it in Univision even though the only two words I understood were pelota and goal. And even that was oodles better than NBC. I wish I could stream CBC from somewhere or at least pay for coverage that just keeps the damn commentators quite unless absolutely necessary. Unfortunately AFAIK the way the whole thing is setup, there really is no choice in the matter.
We have a 'pay tv' network which has 4 channels dedicated to Olympic coverage, and it costs $65 extra for the privilege.
It also seems like half of the broadcast is just montages and irrelevant interviews like Grant Hackett interviewing Michael Phelps.
I must say it's by far the best way to get it. Its the best coverage I've seen of the olympics here. Way better than Beijing. Every event is on live and then replayed at night. Very slick, good commentating, and not too much australian person who came 22nd hyperbole.
That was the first sentence, and they lost me right there.
The first night I watched they went on and on (and on) for so long about how absolutely desperate Canada was to win a gold (and on and on) I thought I was viewing Canadian TV. Later they showed the mogul skiing event (I believe it was) and were so focused on the fact that a Canadian had won gold that they never even mentioned how the US skier did. Only later did I find out he took bronze.
It sounds like the author was just mad that the US-Canada hockey game was pushed to MSNBC. I would have loved to have seen that game in HD on the main NBC, but that's a long way from the coverage being "broken".
Is there a business reason for giving the East coast preferential treatment West coast events and vice versa?
It's not preferential treatment per se (east coast is seeing taped events as well), it's just that most people aren't home from work yet at 5pm.
We have three channels that are broadcasting the Olympics probably 12-16 hours a day. And it's not just because they're in Canada this year, it's pretty standard to have great coverage.
I remember being in the US during the Atlanta Olympics and couldn't believe that they were only shown for a few hours a day with limited events.
I might try this later, if it works I'll report back.
EDIT: I got it working, the location I am right now has less than 1Mbps down so I cant tell if the lag is due to the VPN and the distance or the BW limitation. In a little bit I'll be home and I can test with a better connection (8Mbps)
As for the couch and large TV aspect, I suppose I would have to agree with you.
Sure there are lots of official stats out there, but I was unable to find the figure skating for my wife. In the end, she was reduced to watching it in Greek (we think) on a tiny Justintv station.
NBC paid a lot of money to secure coverage of the games. I wish they had put more effort into making them actually available to people.
Because CTV (Canadian company with broadcasting rights to the olympics) really did an excellent job of presenting the olympics this year.
Market failure -> people will find a way.
Video player spins forever with the message "we're experiencing temporary difficulty"
One annoying thing about that though: you have to subscribe to a cable or satellite service in order to actually view it. Why should NBC care if I have DirecTV or not? It also requires Silverlight, which begs the question: why aren't they using Hulu for this?
With that said, the other complaints this article raises I agree with.