Despite countless complaints over NBC's stingy coverage of the Winter Olympics, the network insists that Americans had "record" access to the events.
Senator Herb Kohl of Wisconsin had sent NBC a letter in February, asking why people who didn't pay for television service weren't allowed to watch live online streams of Winter Olympics coverage, The Hill reports. NBC Chief Executive Officer Jeff Zucker countered that the network spent more than $1 billion on coverage, and that Americans had more access to the events than any previous Winter Olympics.
Zucker said treating pay TV and broadcast viewers differently was necessary, or else "NBCU would simply not be able to bring our complete Olympics coverage to the American public."
TechDirt's Mike Masnick pokes a big hole in NBC's claim of record coverage, noting that "Winter Olympics" was the operative term. NBC actually did provide more coverage to the Summer Olympics two years ago, and Web video hadn't really taken off in 2006, so comparing to the previous Winter Olympics isn't really fair anyway. He also noted, as several commenters did here, that the Olympics coverage in Canada was far superior.
NBC is under scrutiny from lawmakers as cable provider Comcast looks to buy a controlling stake in the network. Kohl is concerned that if the acquisition goes through, withholding online content from people who don't pay for television will become "a standard policy." Instead, Kohl believes the Internet should be a competitive alternative to cable or satellite television, not merely a supplement.
Judging from The Hill's report, NBC didn't really answer the question. The network merely argued that the way it covered the Olympics was necessary to recoup costs.
I wonder whether it was worthwhile. I'm not the only one who complained about the coverage. Do a Google search for "NBC Olympics coverage" and you'll find plenty of negative results on the first page. It was widely publicized that NBC was likely to lose money on the Olympics, but the ill-will from sports fans and the increased scrutiny from lawmakers might be a bigger price to pay.
