The Olympics - I've lost that lovin feeling

Taking nothing away from the cities that host them - a lot of people do an amazing job of preparing and putting them on, or those that dedicate their lives to the events - I just haven't felt ANY interest in the last several Olympics in even tuning in. Does anyone else feel this way? I'm not sure if it's the fact that they are now every two years and have become less of an 'event', information overload, too many other options, media/corporate spectacle... I guess all of those things now that I type them out. Anyone else like this?

Somewhat. Not like the days when you had the controversy of the U.S -vs- the Soviet Union and their droogs like East Germany, Romania, etc.

My problem with the games is they are pushing too many human interest stories with people we don't care about, and ridiculous sports only added to increase interest of a specific demographic; Snowboarding was only included to increase ratings for younger adults who can't stand ice-dancing, which also is a joke.

The really hyper competitive events though like short track speed skating are still a hoot and intense as hell. Mens figure skating never gets old.

Then again I can watch curling all day long, and admit it :thumbsup:

+1 on the rampant commercialization and "human interest" stories. That's pretty much what killed it for me.

I enjoy watching the high-speed events such as the downhill skiing and bobsledding, but it drives me insane when they show 2 minutes of actual racing, then 5 minutes of commercials, then 5 minutes of "human interest" background story, then this repeats. Even worse when you don't know when they'll be showing the event you want to see, and it's all rolled in at random.

PASS!!

Was never much of a summer Olympics fan, so for me, it's still every four years... That being said, I do think a lot of the excitement about the Olympics has been diluted by so many other options.

Curling baffles me, but snowboarding has piqued my interest a bit this year. And yeah, short track speed skating is great. Apolo Ono sure seems to have lucked out the other day.

What bugs me is the television coverage, with too many commercials, and I hate the way they split up the various events (to try to get you to sit through it all).

Amazingly, I believe NBC reported the highest viewership of Opening Day this year. I wonder how much of that interest though, was spurred by the tragic death of the luger just hours earlier. Unfortunately, perhaps it's tragedy and/or controversy (eg. Kerrigan v. Harding) that up the ratings, rather than the sports themselves.

Gloom, Despair And Agony On Me

It may not be the same topic, but it's the same mood and offers a little bit of humor with the whine.

What is the purpose of all this negativity?

I still like the Olympics, in particular the winter Olympics, but I totally hate the way it's covered. All too frequent MUCH LOUDER THAN THE PROGRAM commercial breaks, schizophrenic jumping between events, and all the inane human interest stories. Ideally, I would rather they showed one event at a time ( with each time slot known in advance so I don't have to sit through events I have little interest in ), minimal human interest stories, and few or no commercial breaks. To me it would reflect more highly on the sponsor if they simply had an occasional banner flashed at the bottom of the screen, or perhaps simply said this coverage bought to you by so and so at the beginning and end of the program. I'm not sure the lengthy commercials really serve any purpose. Most people use them for bathroom or snack breaks. I've long made it a point NOT to buy the products of companies who choose to interrupt my TV programs. Besides, 99% of the products I see advertised are already well known, established brands. It's not like people aren't already aware these products exist. Do we really need 10 45 second spots hawking, for example, Coke?

I'm enjoying these Olympics more than i ever did before.


Because . . . .


Now i have DirecTV, and i can RECORD it,

and (later) watch it at MY pace.


Which, i must admit, includes Zapping thru those

EndlessCommercials ! ! !


_

I still enjoy watching some of the winter Olympics.Not quite the same as the cold war days but maybe better in some respects.Now we can concentrate more on the actual sport and national pride without so much of the politics.

Empath said:

Gloom, Despair And Agony On Me

It may not be the same topic, but it's the same mood and offers a little bit of humor with the whine.

What is the purpose of all this negativity?

Click to expand...

I guess Prozac has been prescribed...

R.E.M. - Shiny Happy People

Burgess said:

I'm enjoying these Now i have DirecTV, and i can RECORD it, and (later) watch it at MY pace. Which, i must admit, includes Zapping thru those EndlessCommercials ! ! ! _

Click to expand...

Aren't DVRs great?

I agree about NBC's coverage - it stinks! They try to string out the events to maintain maximum ratings. Saturday they teased Women's Biathalon for hours, and then finally at 5:30 they got around to showing it, and must have had 5 commercial breaks from 5:30 to 6:00.

If it weren't for DVR I'd never survive NBC's intelligence insulting coverage.

Since when has the olympics been every two years?

You have winter olympics every four years and the summer olympics every four years.

And I'm loving it, but then again I watch the coverage on the BBC - 100% event coverage with no ad breaks

ZMZ67 said:

I still enjoy watching some of the winter Olympics.Not quite the same as the cold war days but maybe better in some respects.Now we can concentrate more on the actual sport and national pride without so much of the politics.

Click to expand...

That's actually why I'm enjoying them more ( NBC's crappy coverage notwithstanding ). I couldn't stand the political overtone back in the Cold War days. Now it's more about pure sport, which is in keeping with the original Olympic spirit. It's just a pity the frequency and length of commercial breaks have grown exponentially since then.

thank god the channel the olympics are shown here, do not show commercials.. well not much anyways.

and that they choose few events every day that they think which interest our public most and show them almost entirely in one row and just do decent highlights section of others (like between a hockey games periods they go thru the other events highlites) and then send a recording of other event after their chosen "main interest event".

no jumping between dozens of events and different sports. no commercials. not too many "in depth articles" either. (only interviews of the athletes before the event or after.. "so why did you fail today then!" hahaha)

even superbowl was nice to watch here, as while you guys watched the dozens of commercials we either saw highlites or replays.. or calming camera view of the stadium or new orleans or miami.. or just saw the teams huddles on sidelines or field. much more convinient in my mind than watching the same million dollar commercials every 5-10 minutes.

but to answer the topic. yeah i also have lost a little bit of the "feeling" of the olympics this year.. hardly any interest in the sports. (the hockey might persuade me to follow more..) but dunno why these olympics seem so uneventful and uninteresting this year.

edit: WOW POST number 777! over a year here and i still feel like a newbie.. soon number 1000

Could also have something to do with some of the epic fails we've seen so far in the past few days....

-Torch malfunction at opening ceremony
-Inadequate electric zambonis causing skating delays
-Trucking/flying in snow as it continues to rain, causing skiing delays
-Criticism of Canada for not allowing other nations sufficient training time at their venues before the games
-Oh, and a dead luger

Not a great start.

Apparently the folks that made it there in person are kind of ticked off about not being allowed to get near the torch. They got it fenced off at some distance and you have to take your pics through the chain link.

Geoff

You'd think that with all that natural gas burning in the torch, they'd at least let you light your cigar with it!?! Are the PC police present there in Canada with no outdoor smoking allowed?

I remember when I was a kid and the Olympics was for AMATEUR athletes... that's when I enjoyed them. Yes, the hype and the commercialization and the stark contrast between the "human interest" stories and how brashly crass so much of the world is - athletes and non-athletes alike - has caused it to lose it's appeal.

I used to love baseball, when I was a kid, before they ruined that, too.

Vesper said:

Taking nothing away from the cities that host them - a lot of people do an amazing job of preparing and putting them on, or those that dedicate their lives to the events - I just haven't felt ANY interest in the last several Olympics in even tuning in. Does anyone else feel this way? I'm not sure if it's the fact that they are now every two years and have become less of an 'event', information overload, too many other options, media/corporate spectacle... I guess all of those things now that I type them out. Anyone else like this?

Click to expand...

Last time I watched the Olympics the East German womens team really needed a good shave. That traumatized my pure and inocent psyche. I haven't been able to watch it since.