O Canada

I think there is going to be quite a lot of Olympics blogs over the next few weeks.  I cannot believe how bad the American coverage is - it's so bad that I've started watching the Canadian TV feed!  Because NBC (the American broadcaster) payed a ridiculous amount of money (1 billion dollars plus) for the rights to show the Olympics, it means that there are absolutely tons of advert breaks.  And obviously they pander to the American audience and the sports which Americans will be successful in.  But the worst thing is that in order to cater for the "prime time East Coast audience", none of the events are being shown live - instead they are on a 1 hour delay for the East Coast, which means a 4 hour delay for those of us on the West Coast.  In the age of the internet and social media, this is utterly ridiculous.  That is why I'm glad to be able to pick up the live Canadian coverage - so for example I was able to watch that British swimmer get gold live, rather than 4 hours later.  And I quite like the self-deprecating Canadian commentary - they're just happy to qualify or make a final, rather than the win or bust attitude of the Americans.