Games put us in time warp
Adozen days into the Olympics, I am living in two time zones.
When my kids wake me up in the early hours of the morning, it’s already mid-afternoon in Sochi. And by mid-afternoon in Toronto, or late morning in Victoria, the competition is over for the day.
During the best tuning times in North America, there’s nothing happening in Sochi. And then just as most of us go to bed, the Olympic venues are opening up for more competition. So unless you deliberately avoid the news, you’ll probably find out first thing each morning that you missed a couple of great moments and medal performances while you were sleeping.
The men’s hockey final will start Sunday at 4 p.m. in Sochi. That’s a reasonable 8 a.m. in Sidney Crosby’s hometown of Cole Harbour, N.S., but it will be 4 a.m. in Vancouver. It might be a record day for mid-afternoon naps in British Columbia.
The Olympic time shift is not ideal for North American viewers and even more problematic for broadcasters who need a live audience to watch not only the coverage but the commercials. But while some people have complained about not being able to see their favourite events live and the difficulty of avoiding spoilers from the events they might be saving for later, the time difference enforces a viewing pattern that is utterly in keeping with our times.
While the networks advertise record numbers of hours of live broadcast and streaming coverage, most people wouldn’t have time to watch it all even without the time shift. So the Olympics, like so much other content, must be curated.
Such is the nature of viewing today, much to the aggravation of broadcasters. How many people are actually watching live these days when the host of Saturday Night Live shouts, “Live from New York ...”? There are faithful viewers who tune into Jon Stewart or Jimmy Fallon every night, but many people wait until the next day to find out which moments the online community has decided are worth watching.
The exception, of course, is an event that must be seen live to be fully enjoyed, like a gold-medal hockey game. Otherwise, unless you have an abundance of time, the live streaming coverage is horribly inefficient and poorly timed for our busy lives and short attention spans.
NO OFFENCE TAKEN
Many commentators and viewers have said NBC’s Christin Cooper went too far in asking Bode Miller questions about his late brother after he was already getting choked up. Perhaps she could have backed off but her instinct wasn’t inappropriate: to dig a bit deeper at the source of his emotion. Miller later absolved her of responsibility. So if he wasn’t offended, viewers shouldn’t be.