This is the beginning of a quick write-up I'm doing on NBC's coverage of the Olympics. Needs a lot of work -- check back!
NBC's coverage of the Olympics is a dramatization. There is no telling whether the dramatization is an effective draw for spectators, just as there is no way to tell whether a specific component of a wide-net varied marketing campaign is an important part or totally irrelevant.
[evidence here] Producers lean production toward the dramatization, mostly through careful selection of commentators and filler material, but also through "press the flesh" pieces on the athletes themselves. Composed using lowest-common-denominator vocabulary (words like "gallop" to describe a sprinter's stride and "freak" to describe physical appearance), the commentary produces a comfortable home-grown feel which has appeal for the bulk of the television-watching demographic [evidence here].
Awards ceremonies and the follow-up reports on the "medal race" bring a Superbowl / World Series feel to the broadcast, giving Americans their much-desired celebration and reflection time. [evidence here: baseball's basis on great moments as opposed to great gameplay; note that the sprint-type races in swimming and running receive greatest attention from NBC]
Friday, August 15, 2008
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Starting now, working backwards
Here's the plan:
1. Post the stuff I've been saving for so long.
2. Write original content.
Right to it:
Brock, Dan, Aaron, and I went to Europe in July: Spain, France, Switzerland, and jetting through Italy to make a plane. We took pictures! Brock's album, my album, Dan's albums 1 and 2
Some MIT students assessed the hackability of the T. Not so pretty for the MTA.
Slow-motion lightning! Need we say more?!
A talk by Arthur Ganson, the machine artist of great renown, on TED.
Videos from Tap Plastics on a variety of topics, including mold making and plastics repair.
Index of great road rides around the bay area.
The five-ringed bicycle. Of course!
Umphrey's is playing Halloween at the Warfield. This will be two in a row for yours truly, as STS9 played it last year and it was awesome.
From an e-mail thread I snooped on a while back, here are two hostel-like places worth using in Boston:
bostonhostel.org for the traditional hostel experience
cambridgezen.com for the cheap buddhist meditation experience (Cambridge Zen Center - $30 a night and you get homemade vegetarian meals of an exceptional quality, plus the opportunity to do meditation practice on their schedule and meet cool people.
Remixes of songs from Thom Yorke's The Eraser from tago-mago:
http://tago-mago.net/thom%20yorke%20-%20black%20swan%20(tago-mago%20remix).mp3
http://tago-mago.net/thom%20yorke%20-%20harrowdown%20hill%20(tago-mago%20remix).mp3
And finally, from the press release: "WASHINGTON -- NASA and Internet Archive, a non-profit digital library based in San Francisco, made available the most comprehensive compilation ever of NASA's vast collection of photographs, historic film and video Thursday. Located at www.nasaimages.org, the Internet site combines for the first time 21 major NASA imagery collections into a single, searchable online resource. A link to the Web site will appear on the www.nasa.gov home page."
1. Post the stuff I've been saving for so long.
2. Write original content.
Right to it:
Brock, Dan, Aaron, and I went to Europe in July: Spain, France, Switzerland, and jetting through Italy to make a plane. We took pictures! Brock's album, my album, Dan's albums 1 and 2
Some MIT students assessed the hackability of the T. Not so pretty for the MTA.
Slow-motion lightning! Need we say more?!
A talk by Arthur Ganson, the machine artist of great renown, on TED.
Videos from Tap Plastics on a variety of topics, including mold making and plastics repair.
Index of great road rides around the bay area.
The five-ringed bicycle. Of course!
Umphrey's is playing Halloween at the Warfield. This will be two in a row for yours truly, as STS9 played it last year and it was awesome.
From an e-mail thread I snooped on a while back, here are two hostel-like places worth using in Boston:
bostonhostel.org for the traditional hostel experience
cambridgezen.com for the cheap buddhist meditation experience (Cambridge Zen Center - $30 a night and you get homemade vegetarian meals of an exceptional quality, plus the opportunity to do meditation practice on their schedule and meet cool people.
Remixes of songs from Thom Yorke's The Eraser from tago-mago:
http://tago-mago.net/thom%20yorke%20-%20black%20swan%20(tago-mago%20remix).mp3
http://tago-mago.net/thom%20yorke%20-%20harrowdown%20hill%20(tago-mago%20remix).mp3
And finally, from the press release: "WASHINGTON -- NASA and Internet Archive, a non-profit digital library based in San Francisco, made available the most comprehensive compilation ever of NASA's vast collection of photographs, historic film and video Thursday. Located at www.nasaimages.org, the Internet site combines for the first time 21 major NASA imagery collections into a single, searchable online resource. A link to the Web site will appear on the www.nasa.gov home page."
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