Olympics Drawing Viewers but Where Are The Spectators?

The suits at NBC and parent company General Electric must be dancing in the aisle in offices in Connecticut and at 30 Rock. The ratings for the first couple of days of the Olympics telecast are higher than they could have possibly hoped to see. Opening ceremonies, benefiting from NBC's controversial decision to tape it and show it 12 hours later in prime time, averaged 34.2 million viewers. Coverage of the first two days averaged over 29 million viewers, the highest rated non-US Summer Olympics since 1976.

In addition, NBC's digital gamble is paying off big as well. On the first day of competition, NBCOlympics.com, the NBC site which is streaming over 2,200 hours of live competition as well as highlights and video of competition drew over 4 million unique users, far higher than officials expected and up from the 2,7 million users who had logged in the previous day, which included the opening ceremonies.

The more interesting question is what happened to all the spectators. Chinese Olympic officials have said repeatedly that all tickets for all venues and events have been sold, but a look at almost any competition shows numerous empty seats and many seats filled with people in yellow shirts. Those yellow shirts represent Olympic volunteers recruited by venue officials to fill the stands to make it look more crowded.

Officials have offered various explanations or rationalizations for the lack of spectators, none of which sound terribly convincing. It may just be that the tickets were never sold in the first place, something that the Olympic officials were not willing to admit. The problem is compounded by the restrictions on the Olympic Green admittance imposed by Chinese officials. Tickets are required for admittance meaning the attendance has been sparse, angering corporate sponsors who have spent millions setting up elaborate pavilions which are now not being seen.