Grabbing for Five Brass Rings, by Arthur Tebbel – Pop Art #191 | @MDWorlds

August 7, 2012 Arthur Tebbel 0 Comments

Dear Art,
You’ve taken a lot of shots at our network in the past but I feel an apology is in order at this point.  I know you’ve been watching our coverage of the Summer Olympics and, from what we can tell, quite a bit of it.  We might not be able to string together a primetime lineup that America cares to watch but 40 million people watched the opening ceremonies of the 2012 games and audiences have been good for the rest of our coverage as well even extending to our cable networks providing limited coverage during the day.  I’m not so much here for advice as I am to be showered with your praise Mr. Tebbel.  Shower away.
Robert Greenblatt, Chairman, NBC Universal Television Entertainment

Robert,
I suppose I have to grant you your premise, I have been watching a ton of Olympic coverage.  Some of this is genuine interest but a lot more of it has been a combination of having to wait around for a couple important deliveries and all other broadcast networks putting on reruns in their utter fear of going up against your Olympic juggernaut.  Honestly, there’s not one network with the balls to counterprogram Olympics?  I would need to know a little more about demographics but I bet a sci-fi movie marathon would do pretty well.  You’re doing very well but it seems there’s at least 20% there due to the utter cowardice of other networks.  Dear Fox, I would like to still be watching Masterchef, I could watch it on my DVR in the morning.

This is probably wishful thinking but I would really love to see another network cover the Olympics.  You have this whole thing on lock, you paid $1.2 billion for the rights to broadcast these Olympics and I can’t imagine you ever being outbid, as it’s basically all you have as a network at this point but I can’t help but imagine there’s better possible coverage.  The timeshifting is getting particularly irksome in the Twitter era.  All the information about what’s happening is available so instantly and often without knowing that you’re receiving said information.  Why not offer more live broadcast coverage?  Don’t squirrel it away on your website and on the iPad, put it on television.  Only the hardcore would watch it anyway with the time change.  You can still package your best of coverage for primetime and most people would still watch it because people have jobs and lives and won’t sacrifice either of those things to watch sprinting at noon.  Hell, it would seem you could charge big ad rates twice.  This seems like such a no-brainer that only the network that thought what America was clamoring for was Whitney would mess it up.

Last but not least, ditch Ryan Seacrest.  I know the guy is getting a little too much heat right now and I hate to pile on but this is the guy who made it huge interviewing failed American Idol contestants.  You know what the difference is between failed American Idol contestants and an Olympic athlete is?  Absolutely everything.  It’s undignified for an event that you are so screamingly insistent is hyperdignified.  Cut it out.