kgwilson Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 This might be a touchy subject for some as the Australian Gold medal haul was somewhat less than expected especially in the swimming events. I have always loved watching the best in human endeavour and the Olympic Games sums this up superbly. Yes some countries spend an enormous amount of money to hopefully get the glory but despite this the athletes have to perform on the day, and perform they did. I watched events every night for the last 17 days on the 8 Fox sports channels & loved every minute of it. It was good to be able to watch events other than those featuring Australia which was a welcome change from Beijing when we only had channel 9. All the criticism of things not being ready, (cabbies strikes, poor ticket sales, airport holdups etc) were well & truly put to bed. There were stuff-ups during events but generally it ran very well & the London historical scenery and grandeur is hard to ignore. They did it well and I take my hat of to Seb Coe & Boris Johnson for their stewardship of a team of thousands. The last 2 Olympic Games had nothing on Sydney. The London Olympics may not have earned the title of "Best Games Ever" but I reckon they were. The opening ceremony was spell binding with so many different things including Mr Bean. The medal presentations with the "Chariots of Fire" theme in the background were regal and understated. It was the closing ceremony that did it for me. The worlds biggest pop & rock concert spanning 50 years of the best in British music (except the Rolling Stones). To see Brian May & lastly Roger Daltrey & Pete Townshend was simply superb let alone the multitude of others like Annie Lennox, George Michael , & Eric Idle doing his Monty Python best with tributes to John Lennon, Freddie Mercury & others. Jessie J & New Direction kept it all going to the present day Yes Sydney was great but this was better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mick Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 I am boycotting the olympics until they include air racing and aerobatics! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle Communications Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 The closing ceremony concert was outstanding and I really loved it all especially seeing Eric idle that was just fantastic and the whole stadium were singing along I can't wait for the paralympics...ABC is having it...I reckon those athletes are the best to watch...they are fantastic athletes yet they have huge physical and mental problems to overcome and they are almost as fast as the able bodied athletes. I am just in awe of them Mark Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
damkia Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 Damn, did I miss them? I thought they were on next year...................... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle Communications Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 Paralympics start 29th of August....I will be watching Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnarly Gnu Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 Haven't seen it but I enjoyed this blog comment from someone who watched a few minutes of it: "I would rather stick my face in an oscillating fan than watch even one more minute of that bizarro garbage. I lasted five." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bubbleboy Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 oh were they on...? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 meh I hardly watch free to air TV. elite sport is a waste of my tax money Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winsor68 Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 I am boycotting the olympics until they include air racing and aerobatics! Re-include you mean... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IanR Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 As a competitive sailor I really enjoyed the coverage Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mAgNeToDrOp Posted August 13, 2012 Share Posted August 13, 2012 Channel 9 ruined it for me, I love watching Olympics but when they mostly show events that Australia are competing in ( they had 2 channels - mirroring each other, so not even different events) and idiot commentators like Eddie Mccguire overlaying the commentary talking over everyone else (closing ceremony)...argh, and then adverts galore... I guess one needs Foxtel... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winsor68 Posted August 14, 2012 Share Posted August 14, 2012 As a competitive sailor I really enjoyed the coverage I didn't see enough of the sailing... Bloody good result eh? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Andys@coffs Posted August 14, 2012 Share Posted August 14, 2012 Channel 9 ruined it for me, I love watching Olympics but when they mostly show events that Australia are competing in ( they had 2 channels - mirroring each other, so not even different events) and idiot commentators like Eddie Mccguire overlaying the commentary talking over everyone else (closing ceremony)...argh, and then adverts galore... I guess one needs Foxtel... I suspect that as the mighty advertising dollar is spread more thinley across multiple mediums (Hello Internet!!) that those in commercial free to air TV who were sitting at the top of the pile, have suddenly noticed that their pile is much closer to the ground than it used to be.....At the same time the olmpics industry is working out that for the sport of tiddlywinks the license to transmit the coverage should cost a free to air TV similar cost as a 3rd world nations entire GDP. For a more mainstream sport well....the only chance of getting it cheaper is if the commercial negotiator for the TV station brings his own pineapple and vasalene......Theres a real reason why so many talking heads......the heads are much cheaper than the license to the material. It aint going to get better, in fact worse over time I suspect. Knowing Foxtel they will have carefully manipulated coverage so that an average viewer will have needed every sport channel and perhaps 2-3 other premium content channels as well to get the things that the average duck would want to watch. Those in the know, tehnically literate, and prepared to wait a few hours would have downloaded from the newsgroups for the cost of some internet bandwidth.....Pressuming that those in the know and those that are interested in sport arent mutually exclusive....which I suspect is more the case.... Andy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kgwilson Posted August 14, 2012 Author Share Posted August 14, 2012 Channel 9 ruined it for me, I love watching Olympics but when they mostly show events that Australia are competing in ( they had 2 channels - mirroring each other, so not even different events) and idiot commentators like Eddie Mccguire overlaying the commentary talking over everyone else (closing ceremony)...argh, and then adverts galore... I guess one needs Foxtel... Yeah the Foxtel coverage was great. They covered every event but even had that DH McGuire rabbiting on during some of the Australian covered events like Swimming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IanR Posted August 14, 2012 Share Posted August 14, 2012 I didn't see enough of the sailing... Bloody good result eh? Sure was - foxtel had good (if British biased) coverage - I recorded it each night Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dazza 38 Posted August 14, 2012 Share Posted August 14, 2012 I was begining to think that channel nine didnt relize that there was other sports other than swimming when it was on. I dont have pay TV. I was lucky enough to see some Double Trap shooting at my sisters place, as they do have pay TV. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
facthunter Posted August 14, 2012 Share Posted August 14, 2012 Don't judge it by the coverage. To get to the stage of working out what each medal cost is disgusting. New Zealand did quite well considering they only have the population of Melbourne over there. Our sailors were magnificent, so the NSW gov't is going to cut their funding. ( are they out of their mind). Coates is OK get rid of that self serving fool Gosper. It's nice to see good healthy people competing on the world stage. Money comes into i,t but that is the way the system works, Till we find something better. All in all I thought the whole thing was a very positive experience. Nev Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted August 14, 2012 Share Posted August 14, 2012 I knew we would do well in the sailing, Australia is well known for our boat people... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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