The final total for hours recorded on my Tivo, starting with the Opening ceremony through the Closing Ceremony - 446 hours of QISE coverage.
- Usain Bolt looked like he had to actually push to win the anchor leg of the 4x100m relay. Previously, he seemed to coast at the end.
- What in the world is the women's modern pentathlon? Well, it's pistol shooting, fencing, freestyle swimming, show jumping, and a cross-country run. Sounds like good training for the CIA or MI6. "Modern" is relative--it was first run in 1912. The big change is that the running and shooting are done together--a snowless biathlon.
- NBC has really taken advantage of the graphic overlay tech first designed for football. An example is the Javelin--they show where the current gold/silver/bronze distances are, along with QISE/world record distances.
- Sunday seems to be rerun day--like the men's Basketball "victory"
- They also had time tonight to air a 90-minute review show prior to the Closing Ceremony, which pushes the Closing Ceremony back past 11a EST.
- Speaking of that--The Closing Ceremony has become this weird hybrid of pop concert/fashion show/moshpit/light show/Cirque de Soleil event. It's like the Super Bowl halftime show on crack.
- I suspect I would enjoy it far more if I was on powerful hallucinogens
- Winston Churchhill as a Laugh-In character, popping out of a building--huh
- Batman and Robin an exploding car--double huh
- The Pet Shop Boys, dressed like--erasers? origami? traffic cones?
- Ladies and gentlemen--STOMP!
- Guys in blue with light bulbs on their heads--a TARDIS tribute?
- Russell Brand is no singer--and he's in the wrong key
- A phrase I never thought I'd say--"Oh no, the Rolls Royce is going to back into the inflatable octopus!"
- The worst kept secret was the Spice Girls reunion--looked like 5 soccer moms on top of taxis
- Finally, after 16 days, the UK's greatest accomplishment: a Monty Python tribute. Eric Idle and a cast of thousands singing "Always Look On the Bright Side of Life"
- A writhing half-naked woman screaming on stage, followed by the national anthem of Greece--sounds about right
- After the flag handoff, we get the Rio presentation with all the Brazilian celebrities like--um--that guy and the girl with the hair. Oh, and Pele.
- What describes the QISE spirit better than The Who singing "Teenage Wasteland"?
- Final thoughts--
- Overall, I think Kabletown did a decent job. I know there was a lot of criticism about the tape delays, but I'm not sure what else they could do with the time difference. If you wanted to see events live, they were all available via online/mobile (assuming you had cable). You got far more coverage than ever before, even without the online component. If I had more tuners in the DVR, I could have generated a much higher number of hours.
- Speaking of online, the site and video quality were excellent, even on mobile. This also shows that YouTube (the actual tech behind it) is ready from a technical standpoint to provide a pseudo-cable experience (of course, the content providers won't want to annoy their cable overlords and/or actual owners, so it will never happen).
- As always, NBC is too jingoistic with all the "USA! USA!" stuff. If you wanted a more balanced view, watch the online coverage.
That wraps it up--hope you enjoyed my comments and QISE in general. I'll do this again for Sochi and Rio (hopefully with a better DVR setup).