June 11, 2002
The Internet just keeps rolling ... Let's take five with Moira Gunn. This is "Five Minutes".
We can all recall the first Olympics when the Internet emerged as a major force. It was the 1996 Summer games in Atlanta. With the Internet, we suddenly were no longer at the mercy of major media.
Previously, our options were constrained. Newspapers and magazines could only publish limited, static information, while our biggest impression of the Olympics here in the United States came from television. Of course, that impression was actually the product of a money game.
The television network to place the highest bid for exclusive broadcast did its best to draw the largest audience and the greatest advertising dollar. In the end, they hoped to make a huge profit.
With only a suspicion at the time, that all began to erode with Atlanta. You could look up everything you wanted to know on the Internet -- and the results were immediate. The Internet began to enable anyone, anywhere to make the Olympics whatever they wanted it to be.
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From one perspective, the Internet made no real threat to the Olympic money game, until 2 years later in Nagano.
Owing to the time difference between the U.S. and Japan, the networks must have been apoplectic when we all found out the results of the great Tara Lipinski/Michelle Kwan match-up before noon. They had been planning to draw one of their largest audiences that night, and the punch line had already been delivered.
At the same time, people became savvy about all this immediate information, as well. I know one person who records 49-ers games on Sunday, avoids radio, TV and the sports section on Mondays, and even wears headphones all day at the office, so he can enjoy the game in leisure on Monday night.
Like an unplanned houseguest, unexpected information can be less than thrilling when it shows up on your doorstep.
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While the money game remains puzzling, the Internet has done nothing but gain momentum. At the time of the Atlanta games, there were only 50 million people worldwide on the Internet. By the time Nagano rolled around - just two years later - there were three times that many. And today, it's grown tenfold. There are over 500 million people with access to the Internet today, just in time for the World Soccer Tournament to commence - 30 days of games with the largest fan base of any sport.
Being held in Korea and Japan, the time difference plays in again. Pubs here in San Francisco stay open all night, and locals from all over the world squeeze in together to watch "football" until 4 and 5 in the morning.
And when fans aren't watching TV, there's a plethora of web sites, far more than the now-primitive scores and standings of Atlanta. Play-by-plays, video clips and in-depth analysis have natural companions in instant online translation service for people of every language. And private chat rooms keep friends and family in constant group conversation.
Work the numbers, and you realize that this is quite simply an historic event. This tidal wave of communications technology has bound more people together than ever before. And who would guess that the common ground is their excitement and passion for a sport?
And what a sport it is - all you need is a ball.
I'm Moira Gunn. This is Five Minutes.
