The Original Realty TV Show

If you google “NBC Olympic Coverage” these are a few of the results.

From nbcolympics.com . . . “NBC Universal will show 3600 hours of the Beijing Olympic Games, the most ambitious single media project in history . . .”

And this from USA Today . . . “Network and cable rivals are mostly writing off August, avoiding the launch of fresh programming to dodge the tsunami better known as the Summer Olympics . . . “

And more from USA Today . . . “Imagine the moon was colonized a few years after humans first landed. That's sort of what's happened to Olympic TV.”

It used to be that every four years, the Olympics became the 900-pound gorilla of television, dominating the airwaves. Then a few years ago (probably because of television not wanting a four year break between those gorilla visits) they went to alternating the winter and summer games so there is an Olympics every two years. And as you can see from the google results, it still garners a lot of whoop.

Televised Olympic coverage was the first, and maybe the best, reality television show. Was there a better moment than “Do you believe in miracles?” That was reality at its best. In the early years the Olympics were tape delayed and at most you’d see a few hours of prime time coverage because of the time differences but as the outlets for distribution grew, they went live but still mostly on television. And now? Thousands of hours of coverage. Go that? Thousands! Everywhere there’s a screen. Now forgive me as I digress into my little “I know I’m a dinosaur and I remember when TV was black and white” mode, but . . . OMG! Thousands of hours? I just can’t get over a few things about this. In no particular order of importance:

- I’d love to see some statistics on how many people watched and more importantly, on what device they watched it on.
- I wonder if NBC will make much money at this
- I hope our students from Newhouse have a thrilling time.
- I will be remembering Jim McKay.
- What will be the slickest production innovation NBC will unveil?
- I remember if you wanted to watch extended coverage (translate: the unpopular sports) you had to pay extra and now they’re giving it away.

“Survivor” and “The Bachelor” got nothin’ on the Olympics. Get ready for thousands of hours of coverage.

I do believe in miracles.