February 13th - Old News

Waking up in America, Olympic events are just wrapping up. Some events happen just as most Americans are getting up, but the majority are taking place while we sleep. To help keep us in the loop, NBC and its affiliates have been compiling the best of the competitions to be put on the air during the domestic primetime spot. This allows fans to get in on the action and catch up on what they may have missed.

This would be great if it weren’t for one problem: anyone who actually cares about the games already knows what happened. ESPN is well ahead on that issue, sending alerts and updates on most major Olympic events as they happen. Before I even have time to turn on the TV, I’ve already been updated on the night’s festivities.

The 24-hour news cycle that has become the standard no longer allows for the notion of “primetime television,” at least not in terms of rebroadcasting. If something is happening, the public wants to know about it as soon as it happens, not on a delay or after it has been compiled in a neat presentation afterward. What could be a neater package than 140 characters?

If you’ve ever watched a sporting event with real significance, though, you don’t need to be told what 140 characters fail to get across. You don’t get the pit in your stomach from the anxiety of seeing your team or favorite athlete put themselves on the line. You don’t feel the rush of joy when that athlete or team pulls away with the win. You don’t feel the confusion of a loss, and the disappointment that ensues. We might want to know what happened, but we live to see how it happened.

With that in mind, we’re pretty much stuck. How do we feel all of the excitement that comes with the Olympics, yet also get all the information as its happening on the other side of the globe?

There isn’t really a good answer. Nobody faults ESPN and the sporting world for getting us the news quickly. Quite the opposite. We would be upset if they didn’t. Yet NBC is also doing the best they can to get us the full package of the Olympic experience, and do it in the context of American life.

The reality is that the way different countries interact with the Olympics will have to change not only based on the location but also in conjunction with the technologies available. The days of watching suspenseful events on an American timeframe are over, leaving a few options.

One is, of course, to stay up late into the night or wake up ridiculously early to catch things as they happen. Nocturnal behavior isn’t usually recommended, but I’m sure your friends and colleagues would understand if you explained that you simply couldn’t miss the curling champions of the world (ok, maybe they’d judge you a little)

Short of that, though, some form of adaptation is going to have to happen, either by the consumer or by the producer. This year is one of the first where technologies are as easily accessible as they ever have been. Twitter and Facebook were hardly around in 2010, let alone as widely used as they are now. Maybe the change will come in the form of a new technology. Maybe we will find new ways of broadcasting to meet the changed expectations. Maybe the notion of “primetime” will change to reflect the new “news cycle.” This is still a young system, and one that has some work to do in working out the kinks. But, when all is said and done, the Olympics will hold our attention, and ESPN and NBC will find ways to keep it that way.