Tape Delay by NBC Faces End Run by Online Fans | Hacker News Reader

Tape Delay by NBC Faces End Run by Online Fans

nytimes.com

16 pointsechair11 comments

FTA As dancers and acrobats whisked across the National Stadium in Beijing, anonymous users uploaded more than 100 video clips of the ceremony to YouTube, but the site, owned by Google, swiftly removed as many as it could. Similarly, some live video streams on Justin.tv, a popular source for international video, were also removed. According to International Olympic Committee guidelines, the television networks with the local rights to the Games are the only legal sources of video in each country.

I think its time we grew out of the idea that companies can buy the Olympics. Its supposed to be for everyone. All that BS about unity rings pretty hollow when its for sale for $900 mil.

Someone has to pay for it. The Olympics must be an expensive operation. What do you recommend?

We could start with the tiniest bit of grace about the thing. JustinTV is not a threat to televised olympic coverage. Whats going on here is just plain bullying.

The games are for everyone, form every nation. That means some people might want to watch it on ARD, auf Deutsch, but live in California. Some people will catch some interesting stuff on their cellphones and want to share. Its about the world now, and its not 1960. I'm not saying we shouldn't have advertising sponsors, I'm just saying we should grow up a little about it.

"But NBC, which paid $894 million for the exclusive rights to the Olympic broadcast in the United States, intends to show some premier events like swimming live on television only to reach a wider audience and charge higher rates for advertising. "

Hum... Don't ask what advertising can do for you, ask what YOU can do for advertising!

Seriously, I don't get it sometimes. So much effort expanded on advertising... for what? For bugging people, mostly. Why are we even bothering with all this shit? When everyone (ok, mostly big corps) has "high visibility" because of advertising, then nobody has high visibility.

It is true that watching something on computer doesn't give you the same experience as watching it on TV, but it wrong to assume that everything on the Internet will be watched only on computers. I don't watch movies/shows from the Internet (example from Hulu) on a computer, rather I watch them by connecting my computer to a TV.

I'm surprised the IOC didn't put a requirement for a live broadcast into the contracts with the broadcasters.

Putting it out live on a separate channel would probably make sense in terms of segmenting their audience for advertising purposes. I guess since they depend on raw volumes of viewers, instead of necessarily on quality of viewers, they have to push people to all watch the same thing at the same time.

Why would the IOC ever do anything good for the "end user"? They solely exist to make lots and lots of money. NBC offered them lots of money, so why would the IOC turn that down?

Well, it's an interesting problem. If the IOC is nice to the "end user", they bring in less revenue. A lot of the revenue that the IOC brings in goes to things like promoting sport. So, if they bring in less revenue, there is less money for charitable purposes.

I tend to agree with your stance and specifically I think all too often non-profits exist more for their own perpetual existence than for a charitable purpose - take 3rd level education in the United States - but one could definitely go the other way.

I was surprised because I believe that a large portion of the excitement of sport is its event nature and viewing a live-event live enhances that experience, improving the Olympic brand. I guess the IOC was willing to compromise the brand for the bundle of cash from NBC.

He who pays the $900m makes the rules.

Remember the failed Olympic Triple Cast? It might have worked with advertising, but it was pay-per-view.

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