Nathan's Occasional Blog

For the last couple weeks we’ve been glued to the TV watching various events from the Olympics.  It’s been great to watch all the swimming, and track events, and see some of the stuff that you never really get to watch but for every 4 years (rowing, whitewater, etc.).  [What’s the deal with trampoline as an Olympic sport?  That’s just nuts!]  We even watched a bunch of events while we were on vacation the first week of the games.  Kaitlyn tells us she wants to be a 10M platform diver.  🙂  We’ll see.

Tonight we watched the closing ceremonies on NBC in HD – the fireworks and other bits of eye candy look so much better in HD.  That being said, for the past 2 weeks we’ve been pretty firmly planted “north of the border” watching the Games on CBC.  That’s right, Comcast carries Vancouver, BC, Canada’s CBC channel here in the states.  AND THANK GOODNESS FOR THAT!

We’d watch an event one evening live, and then notice that the same stuff was getting replayed 18 hours later on NBC.  Especially crappy was when NBC did decided to show something live they only did so for for the east coast of the US.  They tape-delayed EVERYTHING for the west coast, but still kept the “LIVE” banner on the screen.  Can’t the FCC get them for false advertising?  And don’t get me started on the inappropriate and moronic comments that Bob Costas feels like filling airtime with.  Spare me.

Next time, especially with Vancouver hosting the Winter games in February 2010 we’ll be watching a LOT of CBC.  I only hope Comcast starts carrying their HD feed here in the states by then.

I read a story this evening on Engadget HD that at least gives me hope … ESPN is thinking of bidding for the 2014 and 2016 games and promises to never tape delay anything.  NICE!  I can’t wait to watch Olympic dodgeball on ESPN 8 … The Ocho!

For those frustrated by NBC’s arrogant mishandling of its broadcast rights, there exists one slim ray of hope (other than living somewhere lucky enough to get Canadian television so you can actually see the events before reading about them in the paper or on NBC’s own website), ESPN. That’s right, with Brett Favre finally on an NFL roster, the sports giant has apparently found enough free time to consider taking a run at broadcast rights for the 2014 Winter Games and 2016 Summer Games.