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No Fury Like Live Olympics Viewers Scorned
NBC Hammered Back Home For Not Airing Olympics Live
The gaffes just keep coming from the Numbskull Broadcasting Company’s tape-delayed London Olympics coverage. 
Turns out that live viewers of the women’s gymnastics’ team medal competition on Tuesday saw Russia’s Ksenia Afanasyeva go splat during her floor exercises. Which virtually handed the gold medal to the Americans early on. But NBC coverage edited out Afanasyeva’s dramatic fall from its Tuesday night broadcast, which in and of itself is unthinkable since 
she’s the reigning world champion for floor exercises. Her mistake devastated her Russian teammates, who were visibly shocked and upset to everyone but NBC viewers. Claims are that the network didn’t show it to create fake suspense around Team USA which was performing after the Russians and already ahead in the previous events. NBC also avoided showing the standings. This is a manipulative and insulting way to cover any sporting event.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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Just keeping up with Fox News….edit edit and then LIE!
At least Fox News starts with facts. NBC and MSNBC are much, much worse.
Nice try, but it’s time to grow up Mike. The only “fake” news out there is on the NBC and it’s affiliates. They are constantly apologizing for their hack cut and paste jobs.
If it’s time for Mike to grow up, it’s time for you to take the blindfold off, Tammy. The only reason Fox News aren’t apologizing twenty-four hours a day for all the lies and slander they spread around are that they’re never actually sorry.
It’s true. Google “Fox News legally lie” and you can read about a case where Fox won the right to outright lie on the air.
That said, NBC has lost all objectivity at presenting the Olympics as a sporting event and have instead shoehorned it into their idea of prime time drama. And we all know how well they do 8pm-11pm programming.
NBC isn’t apologizing out of some higher moral code, Green. They’re doing it because just like this, they have been caught manipulating the news over and over again. Fox? Name one time.
Go ahead and google it, I’ll wait.
…
Nothing? Yeah, that’s what I thought. Money where your mouth is, or keep it to yourself.
I can’t believe I’m taking the bait… I could give you a ton of examples (there’s a few websites dedicated to them), but I’ll keep it easy and just name one (as asked). Fox News perpetuated the lie that Obama’s trip to India would cost the U.S. $200 Million per day. It was repeated in on every show for 2 days straight after it had been brought to their attention that this number was bogus.
And the lawsuit I mentioned was filed by a Fox producer who felt pressured to lie.
I’m sure you’ll adjust your worldview accordingly.
Tea Party rally reporting (suggested attendance figures), multiple occasions of on-air personalities claiming they never said something which they did, flipping on govt policy appriateness depending on who is in office, etc., et al. Some were isolated “errors in truth” and others have been suspicious to say the least. Outright lies have decreased of late due to media watchdogs groups.
Haven’t even touched on the lies of omission. Very selective omission.
While they rarely outright lie, neither do their competitors. Almost ALL of major media is responsible for a litany of gaffs, shoddy reporting, and gargantuan spin doctoring. If you think your vaunted (insert major outlet) is ultimately any different from the rest, you are a victim of fantastic marketing and narrative messaging.
What they have succeeded in doing is assisting in the national fracturing, as evidence by most of the comments here. Until you folks realize the intrinsic divisiveness occurs on all sides, you will be continually conquered both intellectually and socio-economically. At least you’re all getting your recommended daily dose of rhetoric.
Carry on!
What a nation of fools.
Cheering for TV networks? Really? Fox? NBC? ABC?
It’s all corporate news. The truth will always come second to profits. The media is what enforces the status quo and constantly reminds you what the limits of the conversation are. Never asking the tough and important questions, only acting as a megaphone for the powers that be.
You’re all like children, who like to be patted on the head and tucked into bed.
Democrats and Republicans are both part of the problem. Both enabled the disaster that is before you. Put down the pom-poms and stop the blind cheer leading. Ask for accountability from all or don’t bother, you’re only making things worse.
Exactly right. No horse in this race. Never has been, never will be.
Don’t forget ABC’s litany of lies.
The not showing of scores was getting infuriating last night. I’m done watching the games on NBC.
Are you certain? I was watching last night’s competition in Central Time and I saw the Russia girl’s fall on floor. It was NOT edited out. Not where I was, anyway.
They showed the first Russian fall, not the last one. Two fell.
There were two falls by the Russian ladies in the Floor Exercises. They showed the first one but they didn’t show the last one. I was irked because I wanted to see them both since the live feed that morning kept cutting out by the time Russia was on Floor. Afanasyeva’s splat was a massive face plant and yes, it did take Russia entirely out of the running for gold.
And, no, that isn’t not my fault or my computer’s fault that the feed kept cutting out. I might believe it’s my ISP’s fault. However, since CommieCast owns NBC, isn’t it a matter of shifting blame from one corporate hand to the other if there are massive bandwidth capacity issues, which prevent you from handling the traffic during the Women’s Gymnastics Team Final?
This is a real shame.
They have been doing this for years in gymnastics. It’s annoying but this isn’t the first time they have ‘creatively edited’ things to build drama. If you look at all the disclaimers they post they even say they reserve the right to do that. It’s lame for a sports event but it has long been the policy.
It also explains why the Russians were bawling their eyes out after one of their team had a good routine.
Is this the end of U.S. broadcasting? I just get the impression that NBC has won its ratings battle for the Olympics, but has lost the war as a viable broadcasting station. And ABC is not that far behind with its news gaffes.
This crosses the line in my opinion, it’s one thing to tape delay coverage to ensure it airs in primetime but quite another to edit footage to try and keep viewers tuned in for the full broadcast
I’m sorry, I thought NBC was in the entertainment business? Maybe they should just have a live feed all day like C-SPAN with no commentators? And if the viewer misses something important, well, then they can just read about it on Twitter. That ought to bring in the ratings.
Come on. Quit being so naive. The primetime broadcast is already a review… so it has to be dramatic or it’s just a news scroll. It’s called entertainment.
So what you’re saying is it’d be okay for them to tape-delay a football game and edit out certain fumbles and interceptions to increase suspense?
Pretty sure sports broadcasting is supposed to intrinsically retain as much of the actual, naturally-occurring narrative as possible. Neglecting to focus on a “game-changing” event within commotion, whether accidentally or (worse) intentionally, would go against every fibre of the accepted standard of sports broadcasting — especially in the US.
To think otherwise is just plain silly. Silly, I say! Silly!
Damn you, autocorrect! You kids and your newfangled doohickeys!
Correction: ….within competition…
All this criticism yet the prime time telecasts are bringing in huge numbers for NBC. America is still watching and it seems the internet hasn’t diminished the impact of watching events onTV even if taped (and edited of course).
I’m looking forward to NBCs new fall dramas Revolution and Chicago Fire. But, what they did here was shameful. Absolute disgrace.
Agreed. Most embarrassing Olympic coverage moment since “He’s pinned the polack!”.
Nikki, you are trending on #NBCfail. May I suggest a liveblog of the Olympics either tonight or tomorrow night? They are bound to make more mistakes.
I second Jessy’s request for liveblogging!
I was wondering why they Russians were crying so hard – they had a couple of stumbles on the beam but nothing to warrant how badly they were all bawling towards the end. Now it makes a lot more sense.
“Her mistake devastated her Russian teammates, who were visibly shocked and upset to everyone but NBC viewers.”
Geez, talk about trying to make nothing out of something. Yes, they didn’t show that specific gymnast’s fall but they showed one equally as bad from another Russian AND literally had us watch the entire team bawl for more than a minute. The commentators also repeatedly told us what scores the US gymnasts needed to secure gold and by the last routine, again reminded viewers that Aly Raisman only needed a 10 to win. Anyone watching was fairly confident the US, barring catastophe, was going to win.
Also, what the hell is wrong with creating a little suspense? It’s not great television to let TV viewers into the same mindset of the athletes we are watching? That awesome shot of the Fab Five holding hands looking up at the scoreboard awaiting gold was not great drama? I don’t understand the agenda to blast NBC here.
Of course you don’t understand, you NBC flunkie. After all, you’re an amoral hack who doesn’t care about manipulating his audience for a slight increase in ratings.
“Creating suspense”….Are you serious? You obviously aren’t a sports fan. They didn’t show THE NUMBER ONE RANKED FLOOR EXERCISE FEMALE IN THE WORLD. If you have any interest in watching the sport, wouldn’t you wanna see it? Its a game to NBC. Entertainment. That’s all they care about. They don’t care about the athletes, the sport or the Olympic spectacle. They care about ratings and money…Nothing more. Every 4 years, it will get a bit worse…until one day, it just won’t be shown….
You really want manufactured suspense? That’s like televising WWII without mentioning what happened to Hitler in the end. We continue to allow these edits without acknowledging the dangers. Ultimately, what will stop the broadcasters from saying these edited events are live?
Wow. That is astoundingly manipulative.
This is called producing. Its not news; its entertainment.
No, it’s blatant manipulation to garner ratings. It’s not “entertainment” either, it is competitive sports. Sports entertainment is WWE wrestling.
That is incorrect. Covering a sporting event, or any actual news, is governed by journalistic ethics. This is clearly in violation of that. If you say otherwise, you are a cynic.
No, it’s blatant manipulation to garner ratings. It’s not “entertainment” either, it is competitive sports. WWE wrestling is sports entertainment.
Real sports fans knew at noon PST not only that Team USA won gold, many watched it live online or an iPhone.
The drama seems all but removed when results are available everywhere, including NBCOlympics.com before prime time.
I would have been watching the coverage live on the free streaming app, or on the web, except that it is only free if you happen to be a paid subscriber to cable/satellite that offers NBC’s paid channels. Falsely advertised piece of junk. If you happen not to have cable, well, you are blocked at login.
Hey Joe, do what I did. Call the cable company, sign up for a month, tell them there is no need to send a tech, but they will insist in sending you the cable box. Just throw it out. After the cc payment is processed you will be able to set up your username and password on the cable co’s website, and the you can use that info for the NBC live stream. That is what I am doing. Also, make sure you have super fast download speed via your Internet provider.
Just goes to show what NBC truly is Nikki…NOTHING BUT CRAPOLA! You may also term it as the Nitwit Boneheaded Company
It’s one thing to trim down or talk over a long, rambling opening ceremony. But to deceptively re-edit a sporting event is just plain wrong. NBC is treating its audience like children, especially with this jingoistic hyper-focus on the Americans. Yes, we like to root for the home team, but that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy drama on the Russian side.
They also showed one american gymnast fall during practice on the floor to add to the “will they/won’t they” suspense of winning, even though it was nearly impossible for them to lose. They are covering it like American Gladiators. Commentary after the fact and highly edited for suspense purposes. Shame on them.
Sadly, I’m not surprised about this. The Olympic coverage on NBC is horrible. It’s amazing how stupid they must think the viewer is – they jump back and forth between events during primetime as if it’s live.
And concerning the gymnastic’s coverage – it’s a team event. All we were shown were the Russians and Americans. There were other teams involved too.
It was given to the US before that. All three of their gymnists messed up big time. NBC showed the first two. The last one was meaningless because they already gave it to the US. NBC even showed what the US needed to score, and they would have had to try to lose in order to score that low.
You don’t get it, do you Matt. NBC was trying to cut out the World Champion Gymnast in Women’s Floor Exercise so they can create fake suspense. The Gold Medal was in doubt until the end of the third rotation yet NBC had to create fake doubt as to what happened. This Olympics has been nothing but a complete failure for NBC. They did things you would never dream of doing from spoiling swimming races before they aired to treating athletes like total crap. I would be surprised if the Weber family and Jordyn Weber get back to the United States and discover the image of her crying while two of her teammates are being interviewed. Not nice at all.
I should add one more thing. NBC is forgetting to show scores on plenty of events including Gymnastics and Diving.
Another NBC Fail. I am a big gymnastics fan and I am furious about this. Where can we find the video of her wipeout? NBC has gone too far this is disgraceful it’s despicable they should be sent to Siberia for this to a labor camp for the rest of their lives. It’s the most dishonest thing in the history of televised sports. They completely changed the real dynamic of the final event by cutting that fall out. And 90% of the viewers already knew the USA won apparently NBC isn’t aware of the internet or even radio and tv news which were happy to announce the final result.
I found the video on Deadspin and thankfully it’s from the BBC which is the best way to watch these Games. All hail the BBC. Here’s the video:
http://deadspin.com/5930817/the-us-already-had-gold-locked-up-after-this-floor-disaster-from-russias-world-champion-so-nbc-didnt-show-it-to-you
Its sad that NBC is getting such high primetime ratings because that gives them no incentive to change.
Can someone post what NBC’s daytime ratings are? It seems they are mostly unpopular sports..and Im wondering if they can show the live premiere events on NBC during the day and then rebroadcast them at night for people who are working during the day. They could still do daytime programming on all the NBC and Comcast networks – or at least NBC with CNBC, MSNBC, Bravo, USA, Telemundo, NBC SPorts Network, Syfy etc.
Also I tried to watch some live daytime on the NBC Olympics website and it was very frustrating. The site was very hard to navigate and it was very hard to find a schedule of live streaming or figure out which sports were at which time or find the correct listing so I could search for individual sports. I was finally able to see the tail end of swimming (the relay medal ceremony) but it seemed like there were commercials every 10 minutes…and once that ended, I couldnt seem to get anything else
NBC had such a great opportunity with the Olympics, but it is just gaffe after gaffe. Unbelievable. Wait. This being NBC, why am I surprised?