Beijing Blows 'Em All Away

With one day to spare, the Beijing Olympics have become the most-watched event in American television history.
NBC Universal reports its total audience for these Games hit 211 million through Saturday, pushing it past Atlanta 1996 as the all-time leader for Olympic viewership south of the border. The aggregate number 12 years ago was 209 million for 17 days. Beijing's total has yet to include today's programming, which included the men's basketball final and the closing ceremony.
Perhaps even more impressive: 86% of U.S. households tuned in to at least some part of Beijing 2008.
Audiences got a huge boost in the opening week of the Games, when American swimmer Michael Phelps made his historic charge to an unprecedented eight gold medals in a single Olympics. NBC Universal also spread its coverage over nine networks, with its cable outlets combining for a record 86 million viewers.
While Winter Olympics ratings tend to be stronger in Canada, the opposite is true for a neighbouring country that is traditionally a Summer Games powerhouse. Four of the five most-watched Olympics ever in the U.S. were summer affairs, with Lillehammer 1994 (carried by CBS) the lone exception. We don't need to get into why.

NBC Makes Another Splash

What can Michael Phelps do for you?
Ask the sport of swimming, which suddenly has an unprecedented television contract from NBC — thanks in great part, no doubt, by the massive ratings surge generated by Phelps' march to a record-breaking eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics.
The Peacock Network announced earlier today it has inked a deal for coverage of the 2009 world aquatic championships in Rome (which are sure to include Phelps), as well as the next three U.S. swimming nationals. NBC's coverage in Rome includes two weekends, along with mid-week airtime on the new Universal Sports digital channel.
"The whole world watched as Michael Phelps took his sport to a new level and introduced a generation of fans to swimming through his extraordinary achievements," Dick Ebersol, chairman of NBC Sports and Olympics, said in a statement. "His accomplishments transcend sports and, are in fact, a cultural phenomenon. We're greatly looking forward to following the next chapter in his career."
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And then there was one ...
NBC Universal's total Olympic audience hit the 206 million mark through 13 days, surpassing the overall number for Lillehammer 1994 — the most-watched Winter Olympics in U.S. television history (thanks to that Tonya and Nancy nonsense) with 204 million viewers over 16 days.
By the time the sun rises, Beijing 2008 should surpass the 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics, which attracted total viewership of 209 million for 17 days, as the most-watched even in American television history.
NBCOlympics.com, meanwhile, has now attracted more than one billion page views.
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CBC Newsworld's Claire Martin, whose reports on the temperamental weather in Beijing have become a regular feature on CBC Olympic broadcasts, earned special marks in this corner with this line. Asked about race walking by Olympic Prime anchor Scott Russell, Martin said "that looks like a sport invented by Monty Python."
Spoken like a true devotee of the Ministry of Silly Walks, I'd say.
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Will this didn't take long. NBC Olympics has announced the release of a new DVD, Michael Phelps: Greatest Olympic Champion ... The Inside Story. It's now available for purchase at NBCOlympics.com.

We're Not So Bad After All

Anyone else notice where Canada now stands in the Beijing Games medal standings?
If you base it on number of golds won — which seems to be the way they're doing things on the official Olympic website — then Canada rates a tie for 15th with nine other countries. Using the total medals earned puts Canada 17th, but its seven medals rank only one back of Cuba, Kazakhstan and Romania, who share 14th position.
In other words, we're on the cusp of being exactly where the Canadian Olympic Committee predicted we'd wind up (top 16) before these Games in Beijing started. A standing, we should add, that a lot of folks thought ludicrous when our gang was still sitting on a goose egg Friday night.
Funny what one huge weekend can do to change that perception. Double digits in the medal count doesn't seem that far off anymore, does it?
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One more staggering number about a guy who's authored many in the past week.
An average of 31.1 million viewers tuned into NBC's Saturday prime-time coverage of the Beijing Games, making it the most-watched Saturday evening program on the network since 1990.
By the way, Michael Phelps, the guy most responsible for making that happen, was four years old at the time.
Phelps' record-breaking performance (eight gold medals in the Water Cube, more than any other Olympian at a single games) has put NBC Universal (seven networks) on pace to record the highest total audience for an Olympic Games in U.S. television history. With 191 viewers through Saturday, NBC's numbers are already higher than the 17-day totals for Salt Lake City 2002 (187 million) and Sydney 2000 (185 million).
Saturday night's audience peaked at nearly 40 million between 11-11:30 p.m., when the U.S. won the men's 4x100-metre medley relay, earning Phelps his eighth gold.
Oh, that program on NBC 18 years ago that rated higher than the Phelps show last night? Empty Nest, starring Richard Mulligan, which drew 31.4 million viewers on Feb. 24, 1990.

Eight Is Enough For Phelps

A few days back, as Michael Phelps marched inexorably toward Olympic history, CBC's Steve Armitage opined the following about the American swimming giant.
"We are running out of superlatives," said Armitage, whose booming voice Canadians have come to know so well over the past four Summer Olympics.
Everyone found a few more, though, on the final night of the Beijing Games swim competition, as the U.S. 4x100-metre medley relay team — with Phelps putting the Stars and Stripes ahead to stay with a crucial butterfly leg — maintained its spotless record in this event in Olympic finals.
Oh, yeah, did we mention it was gold medal No. 8 for Phelps, breaking the record set by another American swimmer, Mark Spitz, back in 1972 in Munich?
"Seventeen swims, eight golds," Armitage said in summing up the remarkable achievement he had witnessed all week at the Water Cube. "The great Michael Phelps. Now the greatest."
CBC Olympic Prime anchor Ron MacLean went further, calling Phelps "the eighth wonder of the swimming world."
To NBC, he's been the engine driving a massive ratings success story. With Phelps on almost every night during the first eight days of the Beijing Games, NBC Universal networks' total viewership had hit 185 million — on pace to be the most-watched Olympics ever in the U.S., even surpassing the 1996 Atlanta Games, which attracted the largest television audiences of any event in history.
NBCOlympics.com has already generated 628 million page viewers, more than the total for the entire Athens 2004 and the 2006 Torino Winter Games combined (561 million).
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With the swimming competition in Beijing now in the books, a much-deserved hat tip to Australia's Channel 7, which produced the host broadcast feed at the Water Cube.
The underwater camera shots, in particular, were fabulous, often showing us the minute difference between winning and losing. We also enjoyed the overhead views and the slo-motion replay close-ups of the race victors.
Of course, watching it all in high-definition format was just the icing on the cake.
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Photo of the day: Debbie Phelps, mother of you know who, receiving heartfelt congratulations from Aussie swim legend Ian (Thorpedo) Thorpe after her son claimed his record-shattering eighth Olympic gold.

NBC's Ratings Dream Alive By A Fingertip

The man they call the Baltimore Bullet might just be human after all, it turns out.
American swim phenom Michael Phelps (a.k.a. NBC's ratings gravy train) couldn't have cut it any closer at the Beijing Olympics tonight, edging Serbia's Milorad Cavic by a scant one-hundredth of a second in the men's 100-metre butterfly to win his seventh gold medal in seven events at a single Games. That allowed Phelps to match the once-thought unassailable feat of another U.S. swimmer, Mark Spitz, who went 7-for-7 in Munich back in 1972.
Phelps was fourth after 50 metres, 0.62 seconds behind, and appeared beaten until the final touch. An overhead replay showed the remarkable finish, with the American's massive wingspan getting the job done in the end.
Even then, it still seemed hard to believe. Phelps clocked 50.58 seconds; Cavic 50.59.
"I had no idea the race was that close," Phelps told NBC's Andrea Kremer afterward.
Now the chase for eight golds in the Games of '08 heads to its conclusion Saturday night with the men's 4x100-metre medley relay (10:58 p.m. ET, if you want to set your clocks).
Hard to say who's more relieved about it all, Phelps or NBC.
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Speaking of that crazy Olympic time ...
Anyone living in the eastern part of Canada had to heave a bit of a sigh of relief when they saw the semi-final start times for the men's 100 metres, the glamour event of any Summer Olympics.
They're set for 8 a.m. and 8:13 a.m. on Saturday. The final hits the track at 10:30 a.m.
Not the best for TV ratings. Far from the worst for anyone left sleep-deprived by these Games.
Oh, and the big rowing eights final on Sunday, in which Canada is favoured for gold? Try 5:30 a.m. ET.
Get a head start on your extra sleep now.
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So Ben Johnson is suing the estate of his former lawyer for $37 million, alleging Edward Futerman took advantage of his "diminished mental capacities" all those years ago after the former Canadian sprinter went from national hero to national disgrace at the 1988 Seoul Games.
Call me a cynic — and I'm guilty as charged if you do — but isn't it interesting this piece of news hit the newspapers just a day before the men's 100-metre final in Beijing?
Coincidence? I think not. Desperate plea for attention? Might be a little closer to the point.

It's The Michael Phelps Olympics

Remember that old Seinfeld episode when the guy playing Yankees owner George Steinbrenner thought George Costanza was dead and showed up at his parents' house to deliver the bad news.
George's parents were broken up by the news but then his dad, Frank, fought back his tears and blurted out: "What the hell did you trade Jay Buhner for?"
(bear with me here, folks, I'm trying to make an Olympic point. Really, I am).
"My baseball people loved Ken Phelps' bat," Steinbrenner responded. "They kept saying 'Ken Phelps, Ken Phelps.' "
So it appears to be, in a manner of speaking, with the American media covering the Beijing Games.
They just keep saying 'Michael Phelps, Michael Phelps.' Over and over again.
As this cbc.ca story points out, it's literally been all Phelps, all the time for them. NBC, for sure, can't get enough of the guy who's won five swimming golds in Beijing and goes for No. 6 tonight, with a record-breaking eighth in sight by Saturday (and do you still wonder why the Peacock Network lobbied so hard for the swim times to air in prime time in the U.S.?).
NBC's ratings are headed toward all-time best levels in Beijing. The network reported today it has sold $10 million US more in ads since Monday (they've long surpassed the $1 billion mark in total for these Games).
On ESPN Radio the other day, they were all but crowning him the world's greatest athlete (which begged the question: Wasn't he this good last year, when the Olympics weren't on and you weren't paying attention?).
We've heard all about his 12,000 calorie-a-day diet (you don't want to know). There are more than 300 Facebook groups devoted to the swimmer, who has more than 4,600 'friends' on the social network.
And on and on it goes.
Then again, everyone (and NBC in particular) has got to ride this gravy train for as long as it lasts. Swimming ends on Saturday. And there's no comparable golden boy to even come close to matching Phelps on the horizon.
Wonder what they all can come up with to keep him in the headlines for another week?
You know they're thinking about it. How could they not be?
He's gold, Jerry, gold!

Games In Their Prime

It's taken a few days, but I think I've got this Beijing Games viewing thing down.
Watch a bit in the morning, take the afternoon off (while everyone's asleep in China), then dive back into it all again some time after dinner hour. And hang in there as long as humanly possible past midnight (a guy does need sleep, after all, before the call to the day job the next morning. Thank heavens for weekends).
All that being said, Olympic Prime (CBC's 6 p.m.-midnight block) seems to be prime time for a lot of the best Games watching, though I can't speak for what goes on in the wee hours (though I've decided folks in Vancouver might just have it best of all).
Take Monday night, for example. We saw another action-packed swim session from the Water Cube and yes, another Michael Phelps gold medal (nope, it's not ho-hum here just yet). Then it was off to the gymnastics venue for all the emotion and drama of the men's team final, where we saw a Chinese team rise to national hero status (not to mention boot some huge weight off their shoulders) with a gold-medal triumph that had the home folks raising their roof.
Admittedly, the latter required staying up till about 12:45 a.m. — that's actually Pacific Prime territory — but the story being authored there was well worth it.
Know what? I can see myself doing it all over again tonight.
Now about some medals for Canada to really kick this show into overdrive ...
(and what do you figure the over-under is now on how many days before the 'what the hell is wrong with our athletes' debate fires itself up again? You know it's coming. Oops ... it already has. Taste some of the whine below this story).
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If you haven't heard, Nigel Reed and analyst Jason de Vos are calling women's soccer games for CBC off a monitor in Toronto. So, too, are the public broadcaster's crews for sailing, equestrian, taekwondo and weightlifting events. You'll also notice CBC has borrowed crews from New Zealand, Australia and the BBC for sports such as badminton and men's soccer.
But before you accuse the CBC of doing it on the cheap, consider that big-money NBC has its announcing teams for 13 sports working out of New York (archery, badminton, baseball, equestrian, fencing, field hockey, handball, weightlifting, shooting, soccer, softball, table tennis and tennis).
So what's next? Are they gonna tell us part of the Opening Ceremony broadcast was fake?

The Great American Race

They're still talking everywhere about the Olympic swimming relay race of races.
And we're guessing the buzz in Beijing won't be subsiding anytime soon.
We refer, of course, to the men's 4x100-metre freestyle relay, which the U.S. pulled out by the barest of margins when all seemed lost. France's Alain Bernard, the reigning world-record holder in the men's 100 free, had a seemingly insurmountable lead on the final dash down the pool, only to have 32-year-old American Jason Lezak reel him in and out-touch the Frenchman for the gold.
The victory, by a scant .08 seconds, also kept alive U.S. uber-swimmer Michael Phelps' dream of a record-breaking eight gold medals in one Olympics. You know NBC, which has built its first week of live prime-time coverage at Beijing 2008 around swimming and gymnastics, was cheering rather loudly, too.
Still were on a conference call earlier today, it sure seemed.
"Without a doubt, it's the greatest Olympic moment I've ever experienced or called, head and shoulder above everything, and we've done some pretty good things," said NBC's Dan Hicks, who called the epic race. "That race is why we get into the business of sports broadcasting. It just was absolute excitement, shock and the utmost of wattage. It was just so unexpected."
NBC swimming analyst Rowdy Gaines called it "certainly the greatest Olympic relay race I have ever seen. I have been trying to think about another race that I got more excited about and I can't think of one."
That frenzy spilled across America on Monday, with NBCOlympics.com reporting more than one million video downloads of the relay race. NBC Universal's Beijing viewership (seven networks) hit 107 million on Sunday, making it the most-watched first Sunday in Summer Olympics history. Some 81 million were tuned in to NBC's prime-time coverage, which included the relay and Bob Costas' interview with U.S. president George W. Bush.

You Can Go Home Again

Sometimes, the Olympics offer a revealing lesson about how the rest of the world thinks.
That there is reason to celebrate sport beyond the professional leagues we watch every day.
Take, for example, the story of Jujie Luan, an Edmonton fencer who has returned to the land of her birth for one last stab at Olympic glory. Luan is a national hero in China — she is the country's only Olympic gold medallist ever in fencing, having accomplished that feat in Los Angeles back in 1984 — and has been swarmed by the local media since her arrival at the Beijing Olympics.
Clearly, she is still revered in her homeland (and beyond, it would appear. Canada's most accomplished fencer ever, three-time Olympian Sherraine Schalm, posted an interesting tale about it all on her CBC blog).
Now this 50-year-old mother of three is back on the biggest stage of them all one last time. As we learned in a report by CBC's Mark Kelley, her entire family is here, including a teenage daughter who hopes to follow in her mother's footsteps as an Olympic fencer someday.
It's the kind of tale that escapes so many of us, who often forget there's a sporting world that exists beyond the multi-millionaires who play in the NHL, NFL, NBA and Major League Baseball. But for so many more, it's these stories that are the lure to the five-ring circus, the kind of thing that keep bringing us back for more each and every time the flame is lit.
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Apparently, the intrigue and anticipation about these Games wasn't a myth.
NBC reports that Beijing 2008 is on pace to be the most-watched Olympics in U.S. television history, and that's after just the first two days of the XXIXth Olympiad.
Through Saturday night, NBC Universal's networks (seven are being used for Beijing coverage) had attracted 114 million total viewers. That's four million better at the same point than Atlanta 1996, the most viewed games ever south of the border. It's also nearly 20 million ahead of the pace set at Athens 2004 (95 million).
Meanwhile, NBCOlympics.com pulled in a staggering 126.7 million page viewers over the first two days in Beijing, a 641% jump over Athens (17.9 million).
It's probably not hurting the cause, either, than NBC convinced Beijing organizers to schedule swimming (read: Michael Phelps) and gymnastics finals for morning start times (which are translating to prime time back home).
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We keep hearing about beach volleyball is one of the 'hot' sports of the Summer Olympics.
So how come every time they show it in Beijing, more empty seats can be clearly spotted at that venue than at any other we've seen at the 2008 Games so far.
Apparently, the Chinese didn't get the memo about this one.

It's A Whole New Games

Looking back now, it almost seems laughable.
Twas back in 1996 when your humble blogger, employed by the Ottawa Sun at the time, was handed what he thought was the sweetest of gigs. Watch the Atlanta Olympics every day and write about what you see.
For someone who developed a serious love affair for the Olympics at a young age ... well, it just didn't get any better than that. I was a couple of years into a lengthy run as the paper's sports TV columnist and going from once a week to a daily spot for 16 days seemed like sheer heaven.
Just to make my life easier, they positioned two 17-inch televisions on my desk: One to monitor the CBC's coverage, the other to follow NBC. To a one-TV guy, this seemed like the next closest thing to luxury.
Fast forward to Beijing and the 2008 Summer Games. Now I can watch every second of coverage on either CBC or NBC in stunning high-definition format. My television has grown to 37 inches and it's a whole lot thinner (and probably lighter).
Options? I've even got more of those. I can flip over to TSN (again in HD) or Bold (alas, only in standard def) for more Olympic coverage. You've gotta love having that kind of choice.
Away from my HD beauty? No problem. I can fire up CBCSports.ca and watch up to nine live streams of Games action. Bell Mobility customers have a further way to stay in touch with the Games, with highlights available for download on video-enabled cellphones.
While my time at the Sun ground to an abrupt halt last fall (my choice, in case you're wondering), the fascination with the Olympics remains — and, as you can see, the interest level in how the five-ring circus is presented to the world by the broadcast types.
When this blog was first launched, I'll admit I wasn't quite sure about the direction it would take. Sometimes, though, your instincts take over. So here I am again, writing about the Olympic TV coverage for a seventh straight Games.
For the time being, at least, that'll be the focus here, though we might stray into other areas every now and then. I've also rounded up loads of links to various Olympic information sites and blogs, with the thought of making it a bit of a one-stop shop for all your Beijing 2008 needs.
Oh, and those two 17-inch boob tubes? Something tells me they still might be in use somewhere in that newsroom. Just a hunch.
Anyways, back to the Games ... hope you're enjoying the view, too.
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Nice touch on NBC's part in deciding to dedicate its Opening Ceremony coverage to Jim McKay, the late, great sportscaster whose name became synonymous with ABC's Olympic coverage for so many years.
We all owe a lot of the way we view the Games to the biggest pioneer of them all. Somewhere, though, we're certain McKay is looking down on these Games, marvelling at the sights and sounds of it all.
And we've only just begun.

Go Big Or Go Home

Say this much about American television and major sports events.
It's damn the torpedoes and spare no expense.
Go big or go home.
So is it with NBC Universal's monstrous effort about to unfold at the Beijing Olympics. Seven networks and NBCOlympics.com will combine to produce a staggering 3,600 hours of Games coverage over 17 days. To put it in perspective, that number far exceeds the sum total of U.S. television time for the 12 Summer Olympics that preceded it combined (2,562 hours from Rome 1960 through Athens 2004).
Better yet -- at least for American viewers -- is that about 75% of it (2,900 hours) is live coverage. Again, a quantum leap for a country in which perhaps its greatest Olympic moment ever (the 1980 Miracle on Ice in Lake Placid, N.Y.) aired on tape delay in most of the nation.
More numbers: Some 106 commentators will be used to tell NBC's stories of the Games. Some 2,200 hours of live coverage of 25 sports are being streamed on NBCOlympics.com. Every hour of every telecast is set to air in high-definition format, an Olympics first.
What does all of this mean to Canadians? Not much, really.
Other than the 225 hours being broadcast on NBC itself, nothing else will be made available to viewers north of the border (and that includes the Internet component). But still, it's worth taking a moment to marvel at the scope of it all.
Back in 1960, American viewers saw 20 hours of coverage from Rome. Now this.
As the old saying goes, you've come a long way, baby.

Not Just Horsing Around

Every Olympic Games, it seems, has its breakout TV sport.
You know, the event that turns into a bit of a cult hit, if you will, for viewers. Remember, for example, the way curling's ratings startled the bigwigs at NBC during the Salt Lake Winter Games back in 2002?
(of course, we Canadians always knew better about the roaring game, didn't we?).
To hear a Peacock Network executive tell it, equestrian sports could spin a similar tale when it gets widespread exposure as part of NBC's 2,200 hours of live Beijing Games coverage on NBCOlympics.com.
"Some of the early returns we've seen already for equestrian content have been through the roof," Perkins Miller, vice-president of digital media for NBC Sports & Olympics, told Sports Business Daily.
Miller added "we expect soccer and tennis to do very well and wrestling, I think, is really going to open some people's eyes. Track cycling, too."
More than 20 Olympic "niche sports" will be featured as part of NBC's Internet offering. Meaning even more surprises are possible.
"It's, of course, hard to know exactly what's going to take off," Miller told SBJ. "But with the structure we have, the stories of the Olympians wherever they are will be showcased."

YouTube Fills Broadcast Void

Thanks to the favoured Internet stop for the world's young videophiles, the Beijing Olympics will now truly reach a Global audience.
A Wall Street Journal report today indicated the International Olympic Committee has struck a deal with YouTube to beam daily Games video highlights to 77 territories — including South Korea, India and Nigeria — that aren't covered by Olympic broadcast agreements.
As part of the YouTube contract, the IOC's Olympic Broadcast Services (which supplies the Games' host feed for the world's broadcasters) will provide roughly three hours a day of exclusive highlights and daily wrapups. None of it will involve live coverage.
"For the first time in Olympic history, we will have complete global coverage online," said Timo Lumme, the IOC's director of television and marketing services, adding the YouTube footage will open the Games to "young generations of sports fans" who already seek out their entertainment material on the Internet.
YouTube users in countries such as the U.S., where the IOC has sold exclusive digital video on demand rights to another party (in this case, NBC), won't have access to the footage. But then again, American viewers should be well-serviced by NBCOlympics.com, which promises literally hundreds of hours of online coverage to its audience.

Some Things Never Change

Almost did a double take when I read the headline on this NBC release.
"Olympics Opening Ceremony to Air at New Early Start Time 7:30 ..."
You're not serious, I thought. NBC showing the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony live. Now there's a day that didn't appear to be coming anytime soon. Or so I'd always thought.
Thought correctly, as it turned out. That early start time? 7:30 p.m. As in, more than 12 hours after the big show in Beijing actually kicks off (you can watch it all live on CBC, of course, if you so choose).
Oh, and the 'early' reference. The original plan called for NBC to hit the air at 8 p.m. ET. So 7:30 is early ... well, relatively speaking.
I know what you're thinking. When will they ever learn? But it's a safe bet if you called somebody at the Peacock Network about this, you'd hear all about maximizing audience and giving Americans exactly what they want when they want it. Yadda, yadda, yadda ...
Um, whatever. Guess we do think differently north of the border.
To be fair, NBC says roughly 75% of its coverage in Beijing will be presented live. Problem is, most of it will be shown on networks like MSNBC, CNBC, USA, Oxygen and the like ... NBC Universal-owned networks that don't offer their Olympic programming in Canada (even NBCSports.com's live Games streaming is being blocked at the border).
And we do have the NBC folks to thank for the swimming and gymnastics finals that will air live in prime time (though you might get a much different response from the athletes who have to drag their asses off to the pool or gym to compete for medals first thing in the morning over in China. Who cares about the athletes, though, right?).
But all that being said, it's still more than archaic that a major television network in North America would hold back coverage of one of the biggest moments of any Olympics until more than 12 hours after it happens. CBC is showing the opening ceremony live in the morning, then presenting an encore in prime time. And we're guessing their evening audience won't suffer because of it.
Maybe NBC should take a page from that book, too. Hey, you never know until you try. And besides, isn't choice what it's all about for viewers today anyways? At least that's what I keep hearing.

Bringing Beijing A Little Closer

The CBC has just announced that it will provide a daily Beijing Olympics online highlights package in Mandarin.
Starting Aug. 9, the first day of full competition at the Games, the service is being made available on four websites: CBCSports.ca, rciviva.ca (Radio Canada International), radio-canada.ca (French-language Radio-Canada), and cbc.ca/bc/chinesenews, a site launched July 22 to serve CBC British Columbia's Chinese-language viewers in their native tongue.
This kind of initiative is nothing new for the CBC, which has provided Italian, Mandarin, Cantonese, Hindi and Punjabi coverage of Hockey Night in Canada telecasts during the past two seasons (specifically Hockey Day In Canada and the Stanley Cup playoffs).
"CBC is committed to providing all Canadians with the most comprehensive coverage of the Beijing Olympic Games," said Joel Darling, CBC Sports' director of production. "This a great opportunity to serve more of Canada's rich and diverse communities and CBCSports.ca is an ideal platform to reach them and bring them closer to the Games."
Beijing 2008 will receive the most extensive broadcast and Internet coverage in Olympic history. We'll break it all down for you over the next few days, as the lighting of the flame in China's capital draws ever closer. We're only nine days away now.
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NBC reports it has sold 96% of its advertising inventory for the Beijing Games, putting it on pace to set all all-time Olympics revenue record.
The NBC Universal target for Beijing: $1 billion US. The network paid $894 million for rights to the 2008 Summer Olympics, so a profit is clearly within reach.
Given the 12-hour time difference between Beijing and the eastern U.S. — where the biggest American population base is located — that's some impressive feat. It's also a testament to the intrigue, excitement and yes, controversy, surrounding the arrival of the Games in the world's most populous country.