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Saturday, August 16, 2008

Coverage of the Olympics in Argentina II

A laconic summary of the title would be "IT SUCKS!!" So TyC Sports, the Fox and ESPN rival down here, has exclusive coverage along with Canal 7 of the Olympics. They, I just learned, had a very large hand in banning all YouTube feeds to Argentina with up to date Olympic highlights. WTF?!!? As if that weren't enough, tonight, TyC had been promoting their coverage of swimming starting at 10pm. So I, wanting to witness the historic Phelps run at 7 golds, tuned in like a schmuck. I actually believed that they were going to follow through with what they said they were going to do. At 10pm, all there was to see was fútbol. It was the beginning of the second half of some meaningless, non-historic, insignificant game in the Primera league. Same shit they have on every Friday. Except this Friday happened to be the Friday where Phelps could tie Mark Spitz record of 7/7/7. 7 gold medals and 7 world records in 7 events. Spitz did that in 1972. An athlete like this comes along once a generation. And in swimming its even more important because the world only cares about swimming and lets swimmers compete on the world stage once every 4 years. They get NO glory, NO press, and until recently (and only for the top 3 or 4 in the world) NO money. Sure Jordan was great, Bonds (epa!), Ruth, Aaron, Montana, Gretzky, Howe, Bird, Magic, etc. But all the greatest team sports players at one point had to rely on their teammates to make plays. Paxson hits a 3 to win Jordan's first 3-peat. Bonds relied on who knows what kind of "training". Montana and Rice; Bird and McHale and Parish; Magic and Careem and Worthy; etc. Phelps has Phelps. And that's it. Well, maybe his Mom in the stands. But I digress... The point here is that TyC metió la pata big time. Because when I then flipped back to TyC at around 10:20 there was nothing. 10:30, nothing 10:40... there is Phelps, celebrating, out of breath, having just won. AND THEN IMMEDIATELY THEY CUT BACK TO FÚTBOL!!! La remil puta que lo parió! At least my company Anuva deals with wine and I keep a large stock around for tastings. Time for some serious malbec.

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Monday, August 11, 2008

Coverage of the Olympics in Argentina

It is quite possible that the Olympics represents the most progress humanity has made to date thus far. Pure competition within the leisure (by that I mean sports and not business) realm between nearly all of the people on Earth. Having been a former swimmer myself and competed on the national and international level for the University of Southern California, I am glued to the television for 2 weeks straight every 4 years. I thought it a crime, however, when TyC and Canal 7 both cut off their coverage abruptly at about 11pm last night--during swimming of course!! What they neglected to show (and which, I admit, they might have shown during the wee hours later last night/Monday morning) was quite possibly the greatest swimming race EVER. I kid you not. EVER. Please watch it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYnlW-CzIx4 I know that the race itself has nothing to do with Argentina or expats, but I figured that the lesson here is on the expectations of media within Argentina.

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