OT- NBC Olympics Fail (No Spoilers)
NBC just announced all the winners of todays Olympic events right before the same events would all appear on their own station! They didn't even tell people who didn't want to hear the spoilers any warning at all. Complete idiots!
I don't understand how mgoblog can figure out the whole spoilers tag and one of the 4 major news outlets can't.
because nbc is airing stuff live, in addition to the overproduced prime time broadcasts, and everybody learns everything online in real time anyway.
but it is stupid to announce them right before the prime time broadcast.
Yeah, but they are purposely not showing stuff live on TV to make people wait until primetime. It makes no sense to do that and then tell everyone what happens before you show it.
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:11 PM ^
There's a big difference between reporting the news and showing an editted for entertainment version of the Olympics. News has an obligation to report what's happened in the world. If their own network wants to be stubborn and show 6+ hour old events "live" after they happened, and those events happen to run after the news, then tough shit. I guarentee there are people in those newsrooms that are more than happy to play the spoiler role.
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:17 AM ^
Why would other news outlets -- who have no financial interest in delaying the results -- choose to hold back such information. By broadcasting the results, they are actually hurting NBC -- one of their competitors. Hence, CNN, ESPN, etc want NBC to fail -- so they are even more incentivized to break the news when it happens. Now, if NBC just broadcasted the events live on TV and then re-aired them at evening for those who have to work during the day, they wouldn't have to put up with all these problems.
Although that is true, aren't they hurting themselves by being so open about revealing the results? People are purposefully avoiding websites and channels like ESPN because they know they are updating everything as it happens. I wonder if it balances out that way.
I think NBC can avoid this by showing EVERYTHING as it happens. I know they want to put the bigger stories (Phelps, women's gymnastics) in primetime, but nothing would be stopping them from doing that anyway. If Phelps is swimming at 11 am EST, show him at 11 am EST and replay it at 8pm for those who missed it.
I agree. Their argument is that "you can watch all the events live online". That's still no excuse for not showing them live on one of the channels they own.
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:00 PM ^
What about Days of Our Lives?
August 2nd, 2012 at 10:34 PM ^
If you don't want spoilers, watch live. If you aren't watching live, no right to complain. Now if you want to complain about how back NBC is at the Olympics, go for it, but that has been true for a decade+ now.
You know, nobody is forcing you all to watch TV all day. Believe it or not, avoiding technology can be done.
necessarily avoiding technology as much as its avoiding other people with technology.
It is not easy, but avoiding information can be done. During this time I tend to avoid major sites like yahoo, cnn, etc.
It is actually people at work who ruin it for me. They come over and tell me I just saw on Yahoo that _______ happened. Then I give them the stink eye.
I think the OP's point was that even if you avoided spoilers all day long then sat down to watch the events without knowing the results, NBC announced all the results right before the rebroadcasts their audience was going to watch.
"Stay tuned for women's swimming! But first, here are all the results you spent the day avoiding."
August 2nd, 2012 at 10:31 PM ^
This is exactly what I was saying. Thank you. I don't have time to watch the first couple of hours of it so it actually didn't ruin it for me, but what NBC did was just thoughtless!
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:18 PM ^
Most local NBC stations aren't owned by NBC. So they have no real ties or obligation to do the NBC Olympics coverage a favor by not reporting results. For example, NBC (WDIV) in Detroit is owned by Post newspapers. There's no obligation whatsoever to not report those results. Its no different than CBS or Yahoo or ESPN deciding not to report the results.
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:37 PM ^
Local news stations may not be owned by NBC but they are affiliated with NBC so it isn't unreasonable to expect them to avoid spoilers. Also, no one said NBC was obligated to avoid spoilers but it's just good form.
I don't watch TV all day long, but since I spend a ton of my day in my car, I do listen to the radio, where Olympic spoilers are reported as well. Getting Olympic spoilers isn't a big enough deal to keep me from listening to the radio, but hearing them sure has kept me from watching Olympics at night. Just now, I went to MGoBlue.com because a thread said the roster was updated, and the Ryan Clary news was spoiled for me.
Point is, it's almost impossible to not hear the spoilers, and it has all but ruined the Olympics for me.
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:29 AM ^
Did Ryan Clary beat Tyler Lochte?
NBC's coverage has been atrocious.
On the news I saw at 6, they showed results over olympic music but announced that viewers should turn away from the tv until the music finished if they didn't want spoilers.
I think most people are making too big of a deal over the tape delay. I think they should air it live and replay it to bring in a primetime audience, but is it really that big of a deal? People know the results and they still are tuning in.
My job requires me to be up-to-date on sports and news 24/7. I can't wait for the tape delayed info. I still enjoy watching the events even though I know the result. Would I rather not know? Yeah, but that isn't possible for me. I believe more people agree with me than people tend to believe.
Hey that's my idea.
NBC should just show the events live and then have a nightly recap show with highlights and specific events (swimming, track, gymnastics) in their entirety. Those that want to know will know and those that want to watch primetime and see the events in that format will do that.
I know the results but I still get a rush watching our athletes compete on TV at night. The nightly show has been a good way to introduce my 3 young sons into sports besides the Big 4.
At the least some people in the nation might turn off Judge Joke or Housewives of Plasticville for some real reality TV.
Man that was a rant, get off my lawn.
That was always the benefit of living in MI or other northern USA states. You usually had the availability of watching Canadian CBC coverage, which seems to provide better coverage. Granted you had a focus on Canadian athletes, but they tended to show as much live as possible, and you could always flip back and forth between US stations.
(How is the Canadian coverage now Clarkie?)
2014 World Cup will be in primetime as well.
August 2nd, 2012 at 10:20 PM ^
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:08 PM ^
There will still be a ton of tape-delayed events in 2016. There were in '96 in Atlanta. The time zone is only part of the issue. There are too many events to air live, so some have to be delayed.
NBC could do better with their online coverage. A lot better. There's not much you can do when trying to get around tape delays. They haven't utilized technology the way other broadcasters have.
No offense to your story or you personally, but I've reserved all my snark and snide condescension for people complaining about how the Olympics aren't live. I don't have any leftover to spare for complaining about NBC.
I'd also like to refer anyone that takes the Olympics too seriously to the recent John U Bacon blog post entitled "Olympic Sports - From Sublime to Silly".
My main point of contention: At this period in the Olympics, if you want to win the total medal count, just train your athletes in a sport that gives out a crazy number of dumb medals. Sure, the two most popular sports in the Olympics only hand out one medal (soccer and basketball), but let's count 20 medals each for Tae Kwon Do & Jiu Jitsu and a medal each for 3 different aquatic modes of transport (rowing, canoe, kayak) at multiple different lengths.
August 2nd, 2012 at 10:35 PM ^
The point of the Olympics is to showcase sports that aren't just the typical four or five that are widely popular world wide.
And they never showed any of the male gymnasts perform on the rings. I love the rings -- WTF NBC?
I feel bad now. I'm kind of an Olympics hater but I agree. The rings are cool; I can't think of an event that more stresses a combination of strength and muscle control.
The slo-mo cams on the rings are intense.
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:21 PM ^
It also reminds me of that "Still holding! STILL HOLDING!!" scene in Old School. Which is awesome.
This is why the Olympics should always be in America.
i thought this thread was going to say they showed another nip slip.
August 2nd, 2012 at 10:07 PM ^
The most frustrating thing is how badly the coverage this year compares to the excellent coverage of the Winter Games just 2 years ago. Theey commandeered a whole host of stations (4 or 5 in total, as I recall) and had tons of stuff available to watch.
As for the tape delays, I don't mind that at all - I get that things are happening in England and that creates issues. What pisses me off is the salami slicing of events. I don't want to watch part of a beach volleyball match, an overproduced recap of two British medals, the end of the same volleyball match, and then alternate between swimming and gymnastics for several hours and skipping the rings (one of the most incredibly impressive events) entirely. Show me the whole volleyball match, THEN the whole British-winning events, THEN all the swimming, THEN all the gymnastics. Guh. I miss watching this stuff on the CBC as a kid so much, they knew what to do.
August 2nd, 2012 at 10:58 PM ^
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:12 PM ^
There are far fewer events in the Winter Olympics than the summer. That's why we were able to see everything. In the Summer Games, there are so many events that they have to make choices.
What I don't like is that NBC has reserved one whole channel for basketball and one for soccer, using up two of their networks for only two sports. They then air, and re-air, the same games all day on those two, while NBC itself gets overloaded and they're giving us bits and pieces.
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:04 AM ^
NBC has 3 stations (NBC, MSNBC, NBCSN) broadcasting the Olympics non-stop from 8 am to 5 pm every day. The coverage is great--limited interruptions for human interest stories or host country profiles. All sports, all the time, 3 channels. Most of it live. The only problem with the NBC coverage is from 8 pm to midnight. They turn the event broadcasts into highlight shows, rather than giving the sport the opportunity to build its own drama.
If you haven't been able to watch the daytime coverage, though, take the time to do it this weekend. Everything that is of any interest at all (except the "major" Olympic sports like swimming and track & field and gymnastics) will be shown on the NBC daytime broadcasts, and many of those events will be shown in their entirety.
The Bravo channel is showing all of the Olympic tennis matches.
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:02 PM ^
A little rant: I hate when they say "one-hundredths," in the plural. You don't need the "one."
The NBC guys do it constantly. They'll say things like "He won that heat by six one-hundredths of a second." It's six hundredths.
The way they say it is saying 2/3 as "two one-thirds," or like saying this year as "two one thousand twelve."
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:03 AM ^
You know what I hate? Parsnips. When I was a kid my parents made me eat those damn things and even today the very thought of them makes me gag. Jesus I hate parsnips.
Parsnips < hundreths
August 2nd, 2012 at 11:32 PM ^
August 3rd, 2012 at 10:51 AM ^
To add something and get to say you win the internet today. Maybe for the whole Olympics.
August 3rd, 2012 at 12:05 AM ^