Hey, the 2012 London Olympics games have started! Actually, the games began two days ago, on Wednesday, with the commencement of the Women’s Football tournament, followed by the Men’s Football tourney on Thursday. But the Opening Ceremony only just took place today. The 2012 London Games thus have had ‘two beginnings’.

 

 

 

 

The ‘first’ beginning – the start of the Football tournaments – announced the arrival of the Games from an attention standpoint. This made sense, seeing as soccer/football is the most popular sport in the world, and is played at so many different levels of competition, it seems as if the sport never ‘stops’. Football/soccer is the attention sport.

 

 

 

It’s fitting to note that the second and third most-popular sports are ‘Cricket’ and ‘Field Hockey’, if only because their popularity would be news to many people. Why? Because these two sports pale in comparison to the amount of attention they garner, compared to soccer.

 

But the same thing can be said about the majority of events that comprise the slate of competitions contested at an Olympic Games: they are ‘what’s that’ sports. They are largely ignored for 3.5 years or so, only to be thrust back into the consciousness of the world with the start of the 3 week Olympic games. Sometimes, the events contested are so strange, they take on a cult-like ‘ironic attention’ wave, like the winter Olympic sport of ‘curling’ :

But, for the most part, obscure sports in the Olympic games can anticipate being overlooked for the more glamorous events, like the 100m sprint, the Soccer/Basketball tournaments, swimming, and gymnastic events. This phenomenon was quite understandable in the ‘pre-broadband’ era of cable-provider  dominance of live events. Knowing that they had a ‘captive audience’, the broadcasters could guarantee that if the event shown was compelling enough, the ratings would reflect that.  After all, if everything that is broadcast on the television is some form of ‘entertainment’ (it is), it’s natural for the broadcasters to only show stuff they know viewers in their markets want to watch. Anything else would be out-of-sight-out-of-mind.

But we entered the ‘broadband’ era about 8 years ago, in the year 2004. It was at this time that, due to many Americans’ desire to stream, download, and share various multimedia files, many bought cable modems, and dsl lines so as to more easily accommodate the amount of digital data they were trafficking. Smart broadcasting companies and networks followed suit, realizing the magnitude of the paradigm shift that had occurred with America’s ‘broadbanding.’ It was the digital equivalent of a phenomenon tv networks confronted in the late 90’s: audience splintering.

from dmnews.com

Bill Dean

May 19, 1999

Internet Creates Splintered Audience

The niche orientation of cable TV programming is smoothing the transition or convergence of that medium with cyberspace. Just as cable tries to offer entertainment programming meant to satisfy nearly every conceivable curiosity, hobby or interest, the Internet offers Web sites filled with specific information. This individualized attention has appeal not just to consumers, but also to advertisers.

“Unlike TV, the Web is not as much breadth in programming as it is depth in detail,” said Sean Finnegan, a partner and media director at JWT Digital Communications, New York. “The types of mined-down content that lends itself to the Web platform are sports, stats, recipes, court transcripts, personal gaming, empirical data on historical events and breaking news feeds that cater to [the individual’s] schedule.”

“Anytime a viewer is engaged with a program, the advertiser benefits from that focus and personal attention,” he said.

“What makes all this exciting is that we’re not going to be limited to desktop computers for linkage to the Internet and all its wonderful interactive opportunities,” said J.G. Sandom, president, Ogilvy Interactive, New York. “All of the hand-held mobile, personal devices, like the PDAs, are rooted in similar technology, Internet Protocol, which is the one completely global telecommunications standard.”

“What’s compelling is this technology that can send the same signals to any interactive device, whether it’s broadband, like cable TV, or hand-held technology,” Sandom said. “Convergence simply brings together the best aspects of broadcast and digital technology. It’s all about parsing out content and funneling it through interactive devices, whether a cable-modem, a PDA or interactive TV.”

What the Internet and interactivity brings to direct response advertisers is the increasingly precise ability to identify target audiences and customize personal messages to those particular consumers.

Even for marketers, such as Ford Motor Co., which have not yet reached the point of actually selling their products over the Internet, a priority is to develop “sticky” Web sites that have the ability to keep users on site for long periods of time and keep them coming back regularly.

In April, Ford launched the latest edition of its iCollection online store, filled with licensed merchandise, from clothing to collectibles.

“The overriding goal is to ensure we’re building online relationships, and that means a lot of different things, because the Ford Motor Company itself means a lot of different things to different consumers,” said Tom Cornellier, Internet Retail Strategy Manager, Ford Motor Company, Detroit. “For some, there’s information about collecting. For others, it’s a chance to buy licensed merchandise and apparel. For others, there’s a chance to configure a car and become directly connected to a dealer for a quote.”

The company plans to launch interactive Web sites for local Ford dealers this year. “This is important because the Internet is a user-driven, interactive medium,” says Cornellier. “The customer wants to do business electronically. So we have to shift the way we view our relationship with our customers, understanding that choice today is a mouse-click away. We have to do this in a meaningful and engaging way so that they come back to Ford again and again.”

From the customer’s standpoint, there is a tremendous amount of information that can be gathered from Internet sites like Ford’s. For its part, Ford is also gathering information about the visitors to its site, which in turn can be turned back into more useful Web site attractions.

There are many elements that can be borrowed from cable TV and direct-response advertising and incorporated into Web sites, said Ogilvy’s Sandom. “The idea is to make this entire Web experience an interactive and engaging one, because each step of the interaction with a Web site can impact the brand’s image.”

All of the elements of direct response can be put to greater use on a Web site, since the site itself can pose leading questions to visitors, that can be used immediately to customize the experience, Sandom said.

“One of the advantages of this converged world, with faster speed, video, audio and broadband ability, is there can be more utility value embedded in the advertising itself,” Sandon said. “The more complex a product is, and the more expensive it is, the more marketers should be driving customers to Web sites, and using interactive means to keep them there.”

 

  As more and more Americans would likely be in front of computer screens for longer amounts of time, they would watch tv less. They would also be more likely to pursue a wider range of personal interests in their online sessions than would be catered to by tv networks. There would emerge a larger number of ‘niche’ audiences, and user-driven ‘viral’ media. The tv networks would lose the ability to dictate to the people what they could consume. The tv networks would have to take the backseat, and let the interests of the people emerge organically.
And a number of tv networks did just that, mostly the newer ‘cable’ affiliates of the older ‘basic cable’ channels, the dinosaurs of broadcast. Two of  the most notable – and influential – of these networks to ‘respond’ to the new trend of media consumption were channels like ESPN, MTV, A&E, and others. ESPN and MTV in particular created a close link between their tv and online content, making it so that the digital and ‘tube’ versions of their ‘brands’ were virtually seamless.
Fast forward to 2012, and the results are impressive. If ‘audience splintering’ began in the late 90’s , it did not get too serious until very recently. Up until maybe 4 years ago, tv was still a larger influencer than the digital world. But it was also at that time that America evolved from merely a ‘broadband’ nation, to a ‘wi-fi’ nation, and the boom in mobile device usage, from smart phones, to macbooks. It was therefore conceivable that a person with a broadband desktop at home, a smart phone, and a laptop, could spend most of their time ‘online’, surfing the internet for all manner of media important to them. How could a CBS or an NBC be sure that such an individual would tune it at 9 for whatever programming it had to offer?
Truth is, they couldn’t. The tv networks faced a tough decision: do stay the course and try gimmicks (slick ads) to draw back viewers, or do they embrace ‘streaming’ their content online? In the case of networks like ESPN and MTV, they realized the importance of meeting their – mostly younger-skewing – consumers half-way: they would put their content online for free.
So, the two biggest ‘attention-era’ tv networks have embraced the necessity of ‘free’ digital distribution. But what about old General Electric NBC, the ‘official network’ of the Olympic Games, a tradition begun in 1964:
As shown above, the 2012 European Championship soccer tournament that recently concluded, was streamed live on ESPN3, from the opening game to the final. Anyone with an internet connection could watch.  The process to do so was simple and straightforward. This has been the case since at least the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. NBC has for the first time ever initiated a plan to stream the Olympic Games digitally. This is great right? Not after one reads the details of the plan:
from medialifemagazine:
Behind NBC’s online Olympic gamble

It will stream every event live on the web for the first time
By Diego Vasquez
July 24, 2012
This year for the very first time NBC will air every Olympic event live, either on the internet, on television or both. Viewers and media critics have long clamored for such coverage, arguing that in the age of the internet it makes little sense to present taped events in primetime as though they were happening live, as had been NBC’s policy in the past. But the move is not without risk. Showing the events live as they happen online could eat in to NBC’s primetime coverage, where it will still show the most highly anticipated events, such as swimming, gymnastics and track and field, on a tape delay.

NBC will limit access to the streams to viewers who can prove they subscribe to cable either via traditional carrier, telecom or satellite.
Advertisers are generally happy with the move, as there’s some speculation that the online streams will actually pump up interest in the taped primetime coverage. CPMs for digital ads in the Games are about the same as for past Olympics, and there are expected to be more digital advertisers during the some 3,500 hours of online coverage. Dave Martin, senior vice president of media at Ignited, talks to Media Life about why the online coverage could spark bigger primetime ratings, what sort of ad deals NBC offered, and what advertisers think about mobile Olympic coverage.
The portion of the excerpt I underlined is a perfect example of how a company out of touch with the times implements a plan it feels is logical, and progressive, but which is so unwieldy as to be ultimately useless. For NBC to supposedly embrace drawing more attention to its programming – especially the marginal events – by streaming it online, only to then limit the number of people who can possibly view it is asinine. The following screenshots provide an example of the frustration a person will encounter when trying to ‘stream’ the olympics through the ‘Official’ Broadcast partner:
Using a service I’ve never heard of before called ‘Live Extra’ (??), users are prompted to ‘prove’ they are worthy of viewing the Olympics online, supposedly by providing some documentation of authentic ‘cable provison.’ Not wanting to go through all of that trouble, I opted to sign up for a ‘temporary viewing pass’, by entering my email in a box at the bottom (fig. 175). The temporary pass is apparently good for 4 hours (thanks) of viewing, and with the time locally being about 5:50 PM in New York – thus 11:50 PM in London – there is of course no ‘live’ events to be seen at this time. Hmmmm.
But perhaps there are replays, in the same way that ESPN3 has an extensive replay archive for many of the events it broadcasts? It doesn’t really matter, since for something like the Olympics, the purpose of ‘livestreaming’ events is meant to draw more attention to all of its events – not just the traditionally popular ones – by virtue of being there. Perhaps an office worker on luch break but still sitting at a terminal might navigate to the stream, and actually watch a Fencing bout? Or a Badminton game? Or replays of such events? Because one surely can’t expect somebody to stay up/wake up at 3 AM to watch these obscure sports on tv?
So NBC shot themselves in the foot with their archaic approach to grabbing attention in an age where such a thing is harder than ever to grab-and-keep (ask James Holmes) .  The purpose of online distribution is for to expedite the rate at which you can generate attention, simply by reaching people where they increasingly are – online – and giving them what they increasingly want : access to content for free. NBC is living in the past, as is shown by their reliance on the tried-and-true formula of filling primetime hours during the Olympics with ‘tape-delayed’ screenings of events the public already know the results of. Or don’t really care about. The network is assuming that their precious ‘Games’ are as golden as the medals the athletes competing in the contests will win, and that by this inherent ‘magic’ of the Olympics interest and attention can be counted-on. In actuality, a large number of people will be going to this place to check-in on the Olympic Games:
It won’t take them long to ask the question : why aren’t the Olympics on ESPN3?!