Home What's Brewing? Beijing to Seattle in Under 12 Hours

Beijing to Seattle in Under 12 Hours

NBC’s decision to delay broadcasting the Olympics opening ceremonies by 12 hours sent people across the country to their computers to poke holes in NBC’s technological wall — by finding newsfeeds on foreign broadcasters’ Web sites and by watching clips of the ceremonies on YouTube and other sites.

In response, NBC sent frantic requests to Web sites, asking them to take down the illicit clips and restrict authorized video to host countries. As the four-hour ceremony progressed, a game of digital whack-a-mole took place. Network executives tried to regulate leaks on the Web and shut down unauthorized video, while viewers deftly traded new links on blogs and on the Twitter site, redirecting one another to coverage from, say, Germany, or a site with a grainy Spanish-language video stream.

As the first Summer Games of the broadband age commenced in China, old network habits have never seemed so archaic — or so irrelevant.

Two years ago, during the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, NBC Universal, a unit of General Electric, offered only two hours of live coverage on the Internet. This year, it is putting a staggering 2,200 hours online in scores of video feeds.

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.

Although the numbers are not yet available, NBC’s tape-delayed version of the opening ceremonies will almost certainly be watched by more Americans than the live Internet streams. People love TV and still like to get entertainment that way.”Howevet, by the Summer Games in 2012, Olympic ad sales could be turned upside down. [24×7]

Seattle Councilman Wants to Poll Citizenry via Internet
Seattle City Councilman Bruce Harrell wants to tap into the mindset of Seattle citizens via Inernet polling.

According to Harrel, a former UW football player. “Approximately 83% of Seattle residents use the Internet and have a computer at home and Seattle is one of the most wired cities in the United States. Costly advisory ballots are not the answer and our continued reliance on traditional polling strategies and archaic note taking are outdated and inexact.

“Listening and leading are not mutually exclusive. We value public process in order to gain input. Most of the input usually comes from listening to a limited number of committed citizens, community activists, special interest groups and professional lobbyists.

“Listening is a science and the technology exists that can significantly broaden our city’s outreach capability and quantify the opinions of our citizenry. If we prioritize this policy, it will dramatically change how we serve our public.” Check out the councilmember’s Website online. [24×7]