Some experiences with the IOC and the Web
Now that "Donny and Marie's" Winter Olympics are underway, I'm reminded of my first, and only experience with trying to cover the Games. We had built a wireless application to report headlines, event results, and medal counts -- unfortunately, we couldn't deploy it.
NBC had the domestic American rights to cover the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney. Quokka Sports was NBC's Internet partner. I was working as a customer integration engineer at 2Roam, and Quokka approached us to take their elaborate frames and JavaScript confection and build a wireless interface for it. The games were three weeks away.
I had a new engineer working with me, and between the two of us, a contact on Quokka's staff, and our excellent server team--we built an app that would display headlines by category, allow the user to look up medal results, and display that all important Cold War relic: the medal count. Quokka and NBC were preparing to promote the wireless site. We were ready to bask in Olympic glory.
The IOC told NBC no. Their rights did not extend to wireless.
I'm not that enthused about watching the Winter Olympics this year.