With the arrival of the Olympics a long debated point concerning television broadcasting has been brought up again. The misleading term: live.
Somehow living on the West Coast does not entitle households to watch live coverage of events. There are plenty of arguments for this including getting satellite, not watching television, and saying how stupid the Olympics are. However, whether you watch the Olympics, watch any other live events, or do not even watch television the debate goes beyond just television. The main reason that the major networks do not show events live on the West Coast is to ensure that they can be tape delayed and aired during primetime. I find it amazing that one network has enough clout that they can dictate when the events are scheduled such that the coincide with primetime on the East Coast. The swimming events that have hundreds of competitors were specifically arranged to occur in the morning in Beijing so that the "majority" of the American public could watch them truly live. While I have a problem with the fact that the numbers say that since there are more people living on the East Coast the broadcast is set for live for them, but on the West Coast we have to wait until 3 hrs later to watch. We are not given the chance to watch the broadcast earlier nor are events that could be broadcast live shown live even if they occur during primetime on the West Coast. The real problem I have is that East Coast viewership represents approximately 8% of the total global viewership of the Olympics (assuming the entire East Coast population 150 million watches the Olympics and the Opening Ceremony viewership was 2 billion globally) and the NBC investment in the Olympics is on the order of 40% of the IOC's total budget. I know this probably doesn't surprise anyone, but it's amazing that with such a large investment stake that NBC can dictate when 92% of viewers see the events.
Somehow living on the West Coast does not entitle households to watch live coverage of events. There are plenty of arguments for this including getting satellite, not watching television, and saying how stupid the Olympics are. However, whether you watch the Olympics, watch any other live events, or do not even watch television the debate goes beyond just television. The main reason that the major networks do not show events live on the West Coast is to ensure that they can be tape delayed and aired during primetime. I find it amazing that one network has enough clout that they can dictate when the events are scheduled such that the coincide with primetime on the East Coast. The swimming events that have hundreds of competitors were specifically arranged to occur in the morning in Beijing so that the "majority" of the American public could watch them truly live. While I have a problem with the fact that the numbers say that since there are more people living on the East Coast the broadcast is set for live for them, but on the West Coast we have to wait until 3 hrs later to watch. We are not given the chance to watch the broadcast earlier nor are events that could be broadcast live shown live even if they occur during primetime on the West Coast. The real problem I have is that East Coast viewership represents approximately 8% of the total global viewership of the Olympics (assuming the entire East Coast population 150 million watches the Olympics and the Opening Ceremony viewership was 2 billion globally) and the NBC investment in the Olympics is on the order of 40% of the IOC's total budget. I know this probably doesn't surprise anyone, but it's amazing that with such a large investment stake that NBC can dictate when 92% of viewers see the events.
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