This is what makes the difference for me regarding Canadian vs. American Olympic media coverage:
1) 2 simultaneous events going on. Canada's women's soccer team quarter final game and Summer MacIntosh's 3rd, I believe, gold medal swim.
CBC covered the live soccer game in full, for the full uninterrupted duration of the 2 hour or so length of the match. NO swirching over for the 10 or so minutes of Summer's 3rd gold medal swimming final win at fuckin all!
CBC could have pictured-in-pictured that soccer game to the top right-hand corner of the screen for the very few minutes to cover a frickin HISTORIC SWIM. Think about it. A disgraced soccer team playing a 2 hour or so, quarter final game, NOT a gold medal game, consumes all of CBC's frickin airtime, leaving viewers looking to view the historic swim in the lurch and sending them elsewhere.
That elsewhere was live NBC coverage of the Summer's historic swim. AND this is what CBC should have done.
2) Here's the thing. I have been watching the Olympics since '68. The American networks were notorious for overbearing partisanship in their coverage for decades. Fawning overly long personal background stories on the "the stars" of their choosing. BUT now, CBC takes the cake in this dept. Some of their segments are vomit inducing and on the whole overwhelms the audience with syrupy sappy smarminess.
Leave the CBC, take the NBC.
