Dear United Kingdom, You can be our colonial masters again if you bring @BBC #Olympics coverage with you. Love, America. — notLikeNormalPeople @notlikenormal
Funny thing #NBCfail, the ads never freeze like your pathetic live stream does. You are abominable. I’d be fired if I did my job like you. — Steve Weinstein @steveweinstein
I am starting to think NBC is intentionally nuking their streaming of events that will be tape-delayed. — Jeb @tatsumaki4ryu
@TVvInce I am adopting the NBC approach to breaking news: my actual article will go up an hour or so after Twitter has learned about it. — Guy Adams @guyadams
And while away on commercial break, NBC Sports Network missed Japan’s second goal. — Steven Goff @SoccerInsider
It started off well enough.
Thanks to our dysfunctional public transport system I was queueing at Guildford Station to buy a ticket, even though I had completed my journey.
In front of me was an American woman, before her a young girl.
The girl had a Union Jack (British flag) painted on her cheek.
American woman: Are you going to see the Olympics?
Young girl: Yes.
American woman: What to see?
Young girl: Basketball.
American woman: Who is playing?
Young girl: Team GB and USA.
American woman: Will you be cheering the American team?
Young girl: No!
That did it. The American woman then tried to impress all with the fact that she had been at college with top basketball players and named at least one of them who was seven foot tall.
Does he drop the ball in the net?
What she did not seem to realise is that Brits have zero interest in basketball.
She then proceeded to slag off the BBC London 2012 Olympic coverage, their commentary was awful as they did not know what they were talking about (they referred to The Ukraine), and that NBC was vastly superior.
Really, NBC vastly superior!
NBC does not show the coverage live, instead it is delayed three hours for the East Coast, six hours for the West Coast.
When this was pointed out to her the reaction was, so. It seemed lost on her that the rest of the world saw it live.
And as for the commentary:
The opening ceremony was chatted over the top, as too difficult for an American audience to understand, Brunel was referred to as George Washington. Who is Tim Berners Lee? The tribute to the victims of the London 7/7 bombings was cut. Australia was apparently somewhere in the middle of Europe. Small countries were where the terrorists came from.
Last weekend the cycle route through the Surrey Hills was apparently lined with châteaus.
Such has been the almost exclusive focus on American athletes, that one person asked on #NBCFail had all the other athletes gone home after the opening ceremony.
Americans have been using the net to watch BBC because NBC coverage is so bad.
NBC has pointed to viewing figures but these are meaningless when NBC has a broadcast monopoly for which it paid a staggering $1 billion.
When Guy Adams, a journalist on The Independent, slammed NBC for their abysmal Olympic coverage, he had his twitter account suspended (now reinstated).
It was suggested to the American she watched through the net (she was complaining a limited choice), she said she had not internet. A little backward, no internet.
When a few of these points were made to her, her response was: You Brits are sooo arrogant!
A bit rich, an American calling Brits arrogant. The pot calling the kettle black?
She fortunately shut up. But at least she kept the queue amused whilst we patiently waited our turn to buy a ticket.
Brits get the BBC, which unlike NBC is there to serve its viewers not the markets. Brits also get free health care too, hence the NHS featuring in the London 2012 Olympic Games opening ceremony.
Top Story in The Digital Mission Daily (Tuesday 7August 2012).
- NBC’s jingoistic joke
- NBC, big bucks and Starbucks
- Taiwanese Animators Nailed the #NBCFail Situation
- Dan Hicken of NBC-Jacksonville is Fairly Upset at Bob Costas for Staying on Air Past Midnight
- NBC Sports Chairman Mark Lazarus Continues Arrogant, Tone Deaf Response to Olympics Criticism
- Twitter, NBC, and the “Streisand Effect”
- #NBCFAIL Abysmal London 2012 coverage by NBC
- How an American Can Stream the BBC’s Official Olympics Coverage and Overcome #NBCFail
Tags: #nbcfail, basketball, London 2012, NBC Fail
Keithpp's Blog 
August 3, 2012 at 10:18 pm |
People like her are the reason the NBC coverage is so bad! The aim is to serve the lowest of the low and feed them jingoistic pap filled with a few events, bad cheap commentary and maximum commercial interruption ensuring maximum profit. They run ads during play of a football match and the sheep of America bow to the corporate shrine.
August 4, 2012 at 7:05 pm |
I laughed at the part where someone had asked if all the other athletes had gone home!
August 7, 2012 at 10:50 pm |
I’m wondering how the British might have responded to NBC’s lauding of how the USA “liberated” Grenada (noted when Grenada picked up a track gold). If there was one thing that came between Reagan and Thatcher it was her bitter opposition to his action there. He couldn’t be honest with her at one point to say the invasion had begun. But then memories fade and the legend becomes the reality. Ignorance is Strength.
August 8, 2012 at 12:09 am |
From what I can remember at the time Grenada was not in need of liberation. They had at the time Cuban doctors.
But then Reagan was paranoid about imminent invasion from Nicaragua which made him a laughing stock in Latin America.
But on the plus side, he did forge a good relationship with Russia, as did Bush Snr, which the cretins who followed squandered.