These were supposed to be the "Twitter Olympics," the first games in which real-time social media became an integral and unavoidable part of the Olympic experience. And while Twitter and Instagram have been a big part of the London games, what we may be seeing even more than a new media explosion is the crumbling of old media as we know it.
Usain Bolt's historic gold medal race in the men's 100M in London yesterday was viewed live by an estimated two billion people worldwide. And despite the race beginning at a very reasonable hour in the United States (4:50 p.m. eastern time), not a single American was able to watch the race live -- at least not legally.
NBC decided not to air the race live, instead holding it to show in their primetime package.
NBC has stuck to its guns in these Olympics, refusing to give its customers what they want -- an option to watch events live. NBC has insisted that despite the loud bellyaching of viewers, their plan has been a success because ratings have been through the roof. They had better savor those 2012 ratings and the ad revenue that comes with, because NBC's insolence may have been the straw that breaks the back of old media structures.
| Related: 15 Olympic Photo NBC Doesn't Want You To See |
| Related: NBC Tries To Censor Critics On Twitter |
It's not that NBC didn't anticipate the role real-time information and social media would play in these games -- go to Twitter's home page and (if you're not signed in) you'll see NBC's logo. Instead, they were arrogant enough to think they could ignore the desires of consumers and ram a bad product down our throats because we have no other options.
Well, fool us once, shame on you. But fool us twice...
Illegal streaming sites are going to start killing television as we know it. Content piracy is not and never has been driven by consumer's desire to steal. The reason the masses pirate music and movies and TV is because these sites are the only ones who offer what consumers want.
We do not want to watch Usain Bolt run on four-hour tape delay when we already know the outcome of the race. We do not want to pay for 276 cable channels when we really only want six of them. We do not want our lives dictated to us by television executives. The slower big TV is to react to our desires, the lesser the chance that they will survive the transition.
Before long, our television sets will have merged fully with our computers, our tablets, our phones, and we will be buying our television content a la carte, directly from the producers. You'd be surprised at how easy it is already to watch all the TV you want to watch, without buying cable. Between Netflix, Hulu, MLB TV, live streaming -- there's not much out there that you can't watch online and project onto your big screen TV.
NBC is so happy with their good ratings they seem to be completely missing the point -- that they've given us a shitty product, and that we won't stand for this again. Has we known how frustratingly bad the domestic live coverage would be, the internet would have better equiped itself to find ways to circumvent NBC's antiquated format, and we'd all be content to stream it online. But now we know.
NBC can try to align itself with Twitter. It can try to use its klout to censor Twitter. But is won't work. Twitter is too organic, too democratic. Remember SOPA? NBC and the other network could be next in line for a take down.
NBC may have scored rating success in 2012, but the network has also gone a long ways to killing its own industry. By 2014, it'll be different -- better for us and worse for NBC. Imagine how much things will change by 2020 or 2024.
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Follow on Ology: Bison Messink | 2012 Olympics
Follow on Twitter: @BisonMessink | @OlogySports
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