Did you watch the Olympics?
What, they aren’t over yet? Are you sure?
Look, I’m not exactly a sports fan – although I really like football, playing soccer and watching baseball. In the past I never missed the Winter Olympics, marking time by learning to pronounce names like Lillehammer, Innsbruck and Nagano.
But something is different this time – because I couldn’t honestly care less about these games. And I’m not alone it seems.
Part of the problem was the hype. I don’t do hype. In fact, if you want to turn me off to something – hype it. I think that my gut tells me if you have to hype something, then there is something wrong with that “something”. Perhaps it’s from growing up in an age when consumption and the marketing that drives it has become something of a pasttime in itself. So I tune it out.
NBC hyped the living crap out of these games. I don’t even watch NBC much anymore. In fact, I don’t even known when the last time was that I actually watched something on that channel. But I do know that NBC planned to carry the games, and that its regularly scheduled programming would disappear for the two weeks while it did so.
So for the past week and a half I haven’t watched NBC. I haven’t seen a single event. I watched a couple of speed skating matches between China and South Korea but then surfed away after a few minutes.
There was even a local boy who was shooting for a medal in ice dancing – a flamboyant, outspoken kid who talked the talk – but ended up not walking the walk. He didn’t medal and so all the hype surrounding him disappeared overnight. No more front page articles for that kid for the next 4 years.
The Olympics have become too much of a spectacle. When you have skaters whizzing around with flames shooting out the back of their heads during the opening ceremonies, one has to wonder what the next opening ceremony must do to top that.
Also, consider the best American Winter Games moment of recent history: the 1980 Miracle on Ice when the US Hockey team won the gold medal. One reason why that moment is so special is because it was unexpected. No one thought the US hockey team to go all the way – and when it did, it became remarkable and damn near legendary.
You can’t have repeats of 1980 every four years. It’s simply not possible, and when the marketers try to manufacture that moment in order to boost ratings for a firm that paid too much for the rights to broadcast the games, they inevitably fail. When the do you have what you have today: a small audience.
The Olympic Committee should reflect on the American lack of interest in these games so that in 2010 people here are interested, perhaps even passionate about the games again. For starters it can start by toning down (and speeding up) the Opening Ceremonies. Here’s a hint: shorten the Opening Ceremonies to Opening Ceremony. You can’t make people marching around a ring behind their flag exciting without doing either of two things: making them do so naked or handing them guns and grenades. Since we are talking the Winter Olympics here, I suppose it’s too cold for the former and the Olympic Spirit of nonviolence unfortunately rules out the latter.
The next broadcaster of the games shouldn’t pay as much for the broadcasting rights in order for it to avoid being compelled to justify the cost by hyping the living daylights out of the games. Let the natural excitement of the sports come through.
Less is more. Simplicity. Core values. These are the attributes of the games that make them special. Then, and only then, will you get viewers like me to care about the games.
Leave a comment