Tuesday, July 31, 2012

NBC Exec to unhappy viewers: "Consume, citizen."

Chairman Mark Lazarus defends NBC Sports' decision for tape delay -  SportsBusiness Daily Global
Published on www.sportsbusinessdaily.com | shared via feedly

"I think what we've proven is that the American viewing public likes the way we tell the story and wants to gather in front of the television with their friends and family — even if they have the ability to watch it live either on television or digitally," Lazarus said. "I inherently trust that decision is the right one and that people want to see these events."

Lazarus said that he has heard the complaints from Twitter, where tweeters protesting NBC's decision to tape delay certain events added "#NBCFail" to their tweets. But Lazarus said he trusts NBC executives and their years of Olympic experience with making programming decisions that are based on years of research. "As programmers, we are charged to manage the business. And this is a business," he said. "It's not everyone's inalienable right to get whatever they want. We are charged with making smart decisions for our company, for our shareholders and to present the product the way we believe is best."

NBC also received a lot of criticism for not showing the Games' opening ceremony live. Lazarus said the network never planned to stream the opening or closing ceremony live, saying that such an event would be too difficult online without proper commentary.

"We don't believe that a raw feed, which would be a host feed, without narration and broadcasting, would be a good user experience in a big stadium with lots of camera cuts," he said. "We think we created the best experience. Frankly, I think all of the noise about Queen Elizabeth and Paul McCartney on social media and in the digital world helped build excitement for our prime-time show."
Original article here.

Pretty darned arrogant, don't you think?

There's a reason for his conceit--NBC's ratings have been through the roof and could surpass those of the 2008 games in Beijing.

That doesn't mean the viewing public likes how the games are being shown. It just means that they're going to hold their noses and cheer for Team USA despite NBC's attempts to ruin the experience.

This is the same organization that had Twitter force one of its most vocal critics into silence.

They don't really give a damn what you think about their coverage and if you dare take to the streets to voice your displeasure, there might be a price to pay.

1 comments :

Unknown said...

I didn't know people still cared about the Olympics. If I want to see foreigners racing, I go to Kroger's and watch them race around, spending their food stamps.

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