2024 Olympics - General commentary

Is anyone watching the Games on Peacock or a similar service? There’s a lot I would like to see, including even a replay of the Opening Ceremony, without the NBC broadcast filter. It would be really great to watch things as broadcast by the European Broadcast Network. I do y know have Peacock now but would pay for the kind of coverage I want.
 
AtlBluRew said:
Is anyone watching the Games on Peacock or a similar service? There’s a lot I would like to see, including even a replay of the Opening Ceremony, without the NBC broadcast filter. It would be really great to watch things as broadcast by the European Broadcast Network. I do y know have Peacock now but would pay for the kind of coverage I want.
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I am watching on Peacock. It’s good and bad. I like how I can literally watch anything I want. So for instance, at 230 I can switch to the swimming feed to make sure that I see everything live. It’s cool that they have replays of everything too.

The bad - the Gold Zone has such promise. It’s a rotating feed that they are supposed to take you to medal events and us events. Which is good, but they usually stay with the broadcasters in the Gold Zone instead of the event broadcasters so you are sometimes left watching an event with guys that have no clue what is going on and can’t explain anything (tough to watch Rugby with those guys as I don’t understand all the rules yet).

They also have a multi view channel that has four screens at once. You can pick any of them to listen to and you can select one to switch to the full screen. The issue is that it goes to commercials at specific intervals (I think). You could be in the middle of a defining moment (ie Simone Biles in the middle of a routine) and it just switches to commercial. No notice or anything that it is coming.
 
acdevil said:
I am watching on Peacock. It’s good and bad. I like how I can literally watch anything I want. So for instance, at 230 I can switch to the swimming feed to make sure that I see everything live. It’s cool that they have replays of everything too.

The bad - the Gold Zone has such promise. It’s a rotating feed that they are supposed to take you to medal events and us events. Which is good, but they usually stay with the broadcasters in the Gold Zone instead of the event broadcasters so you are sometimes left watching an event with guys that have no clue what is going on and can’t explain anything (tough to watch Rugby with those guys as I don’t understand all the rules yet).

They also have a multi view channel that has four screens at once. You can pick any of them to listen to and you can select one to switch to the full screen. The issue is that it goes to commercials at specific intervals (I think). You could be in the middle of a defining moment (ie Simone Biles in the middle of a routine) and it just switches to commercial. No notice or anything that it is coming.
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I think the Peacock platform is great, except (and this is a big “except”) they drop commercials in to the broadcast randomly. I was watching women’s off-road cycling for example, and they would just cut away during a move or a broadcaster’s comment I wanted to hear for a one-minute or so commercial. That was frustrating although from a production standpoint probably necessary for the corporate structure.

I realize that having a separate producer and team to figure out and coordinate commercials for an hour-plus sport with a small audience may be cost-prohibitive. (Jason may know more about that). But it got to the point I just went back to the network broadcasts of other sports and checked in at the end.
 
OldPhiKap said:
I think the Peacock platform is great, except (and this is a big “except”) they drop commercials in to the broadcast randomly. I was watching women’s off-road cycling for example, and they would just cut away during a move or a broadcaster’s comment I wanted to hear for a one-minute or so commercial. That was frustrating although from a production standpoint probably necessary for the corporate structure.

I realize that having a separate producer and team to figure out and coordinate commercials for an hour-plus sport with a small audience may be cost-prohibitive. (Jason may know more about that). But it got to the point I just went back to the network broadcasts of other sports and checked in at the end.
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The commercials feel like a fair trade off for not having human interest stories and commentators that focus only on the Americans involved.

With the app you can watch almost anything live, and nearly anything in replay as well. Some of us enjoy seeing more than just gymnastics and swimming.

I like watching things I never watch otherwise - surfing, archery, table tennis, etc. It's pretty friggin cool.
 
acdevil said:
I am watching on Peacock. It’s good and bad. I like how I can literally watch anything I want. So for instance, at 230 I can switch to the swimming feed to make sure that I see everything live. It’s cool that they have replays of everything too.

The bad - the Gold Zone has such promise. It’s a rotating feed that they are supposed to take you to medal events and us events. Which is good, but they usually stay with the broadcasters in the Gold Zone instead of the event broadcasters so you are sometimes left watching an event with guys that have no clue what is going on and can’t explain anything (tough to watch Rugby with those guys as I don’t understand all the rules yet).

They also have a multi view channel that has four screens at once. You can pick any of them to listen to and you can select one to switch to the full screen. The issue is that it goes to commercials at specific intervals (I think). You could be in the middle of a defining moment (ie Simone Biles in the middle of a routine) and it just switches to commercial. No notice or anything that it is coming.
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Thanks, ACD, OPK and Mtn, I’ll give it a shot and am grateful for the warnings about the ad breaks.
 
AtlBluRew said:
Thanks, ACD, OPK and Mtn, I’ll give it a shot and am grateful for the warnings about the ad breaks.
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To me, the small cost for unlimited access to watch what you want when you want it is fantastic.

So much better than the olden days of broadcast coverage, usually on delay, of a handful of events. Better than having it on four different NBC owned networks you may or may not have, and better than the early days of streaming when there were incessant tech glitches.
 
Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15 said:
To me, the small cost for unlimited access to watch what you want when you want it is fantastic.

So much better than the olden days of broadcast coverage, usually on delay, of a handful of events. Better than having it on four different NBC owned networks you may or may not have, and better than the early days of streaming when there were incessant tech glitches.
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that's good. My alternative is that I record the events I'm interested in on my DVR, watch at my considerable leisure.
 
Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15 said:
To me, the small cost for unlimited access to watch what you want when you want it is fantastic.

So much better than the olden days of broadcast coverage, usually on delay, of a handful of events. Better than having it on four different NBC owned networks you may or may not have, and better than the early days of streaming when there were incessant tech glitches.
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I agree. It’s great being able to watch what I want live so I don’t get spoiled on a result. I was lucky to find a great deal for Peacock a month or two ago where it as $20 for the year so I got the Tour de France and the Olympics. Totally worth it. The old WWE stuff and some other shows are icing on the cake.
 
Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15 said:
The commercials feel like a fair trade off for not having human interest stories and commentators that focus only on the Americans involved.

With the app you can watch almost anything live, and nearly anything in replay as well. Some of us enjoy seeing more than just gymnastics and swimming.

I like watching things I never watch otherwise - surfing, archery, table tennis, etc. It's pretty friggin cool.
Click to expand...

Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15 said:
To me, the small cost for unlimited access to watch what you want when you want it is fantastic.

So much better than the olden days of broadcast coverage, usually on delay, of a handful of events. Better than having it on four different NBC owned networks you may or may not have, and better than the early days of streaming when there were incessant tech glitches.
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budwom said:
that's good. My alternative is that I record the events I'm interested in on my DVR, watch at my considerable leisure.
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Yes, Jim McKay, I am sure it is heartwarming to some that this Olympian who will finish twelfth in her sport grew up on a yak farm in Nepal, milking yak while fighting off feral yeti in the Himalayas and incursions from Bhutanese yak rustlers-- all while caring for her six younger siblings after her parents left the farm for work in the service of sherpas at the base camp of Mt. Everest. I mean, it is really a different life story. But I really don't need ten minutes of it at the expense of, y'know, actual Olympic sports or spot coverage of events whose results are already reported.
 
OldPhiKap said:
Yes, Jim McKay, I am sure it is heartwarming to some that this Olympian who will finish twelfth in her sport grew up on a yak farm in Nepal, milking yak while fighting off feral yeti in the Himalayas and incursions from Bhutanese yak rustlers-- all while caring for her six younger siblings after her parents left the farm for work in the service of sherpas at the base camp of Mt. Everest. I mean, it is really a different life story. But I really don't need ten minutes of it at the expense of, y'know, actual Olympic sports or spot coverage of events whose results are already reported.
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I was just thinking about what used to be called the Up Close and Personal Segments. Do they still do those? I just self impose a blackout on results and watch at my leisure...those drove me nuts, too.
 
my watching pal (Jersey Mike) and I have been time shifting all Duke hoop and football games for years now. We impose a brief blackout at our homes (no internetting) but begin watching about 45 minutes after a hoop game starts so we can fast forward thru all ads and halftime. Works great...even better for football, you can easily shave off about an hour of halftime, ad and official replay time...
 
budwom said:
my watching pal (Jersey Mike) and I have been time shifting all Duke hoop and football games for years now. We impose a brief blackout at our homes (no internetting) but begin watching about 45 minutes after a hoop game starts so we can fast forward thru all ads and halftime. Works great...even better for football, you can easily shave off about an hour of halftime, ad and official replay time...
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But then you don't get to share the angst of in-game threads or chat! How do you survive without the added stress?
 
I have to confess, I kinda miss some of the personal interest stuff. The problem for me is I'm interested in too many different things, so any time spent on that comes at the expense of things like sailing, or badminton, or team handball, or archery, or, or, or. It's like being in an eight ring circus and having a screen come down in front of you to show you a really cool movie. Sure, the movie is cool and all, but I CAN'T SEE!!!
 
WaPo on Ilona Maher and the US Rugby 7s..https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/olympics/2024/07/30/ilona-maher-rugby-tiktok/
 
Phredd3 said:
I have to confess, I kinda miss some of the personal interest stuff. The problem for me is I'm interested in too many different things, so any time spent on that comes at the expense of things like sailing, or badminton, or team handball, or archery, or, or, or. It's like being in an eight ring circus and having a screen come down in front of you to show you a really cool movie. Sure, the movie is cool and all, but I CAN'T SEE!!!
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If you have Peacock, Gold Zone is their Olympics version of the NFL Red Zone. You get a taste of everything and usually the most dramatic parts. It’s addictive.
 
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