Broadcasting

Likely competitors in the Games, especially swimmers, have voiced dissatisfaction with the IOC's decision to schedule some events to meet the requests of NBC, which paid US$5.7 billion for exclusive United States broadcasting rights to the Summer and Winter Games from 2000 through 2012. NBC requested that popular events, such as swimming, athletics, basketball, and gymnastics, be broadcast live during television primetime in the United States between 8:00 and 11:00 p.m. EDT (between 00:00 and 03:00 UTC) for maximum advertising revenue. This would require events to be held in the early morning between 8:00 and 11:00 a.m., Beijing time. The IOC granted the request for swimming and gymnastics but denied it for athletics and basketball. The IOC has precedent for its decision: at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, some swimming, gymnastics, and athletics finals were held in the morning. Also, at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, gymnastics finals were held in the afternoon which allowed most of Europe to view gymnastics during their primetime.

In the Philippines, for the first time since 1996, state-run television network NBN, was not awarded the broadcast rights to the Beijing games. Instead, the IOC has awarded the broadcast rights of the 2008, 2010 and 2012 Games to Solar Entertainment, a major player in the country's cable television market. However, it is still not known as to how Solar will broadcast the games, although it is likely that Solar will broadcast the games on free TV through NBN, as with the Asian Games in Doha in 2006. It is possible that it could partner with other major television networks, such as RPN (another state-run network where it has a co-production agreement on its primetime block) or ABS-CBN (a commercial and largest TV network where it had previously co-broadcast boxing bouts, and former having broadcasted the games in 1992 Summer Olympics). In 2004, NBN ran into funding issues, which almost inhibited the network from broadcasting the Summer Games in Athens. The IOC's decision likely reflects this issue.

In the United Kingdom the BBC will again be the sole broadcaster of the games.

In Canada the public network CBC/Radio-Canada and cable networks TSN and RDS will broadcast its final games before a private consortium involving CTV/Rogers/TQS takes over for the 2010 Winter Olympics.

In Italy the Games will be broadcasted by RAI.

In Spain the Games will be broadcasted by TVE.

In Chile the Games will be broadcasted by state-owned TVN.

In Malaysia, the games will be broadcasted by Malaysia's Satellite Tv Astro and other free-to-air channels.

For the last time (before Nine Network and Foxtel secured rights for Olympics 2010 and 2012), Seven Network will broadcast for Australia the Olympic Games.

Beijing 2008 Olympics

2008 Olympics Sports

Broadcasting

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