Here’s another great example of how NBC is flubbing the coverage of these Olympics. Everywhere I look people are talking about Shaun White’s Double McTwist 1260 which won him the Olympic Gold, yesterday (actually he’d technically already won it…so more of a victory lap?). It sounds awesome. I really want to watch it. And I can’t be the only one because “Shaun White Double McTwist 1260 video” happens to be a major trending topic on Google. Alas, when I search that very term (and some variations) all video links lead back to NBC’s Olympic page (quickly uploaded YouTube clips appear to have already been removed).

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So fine. I have to watch this on NBC’s page. FINE. Except that when I get there I discover that NBC is using something called ‘Silverlight” for their videos, meaning I need a Microsoft plugin in order to view anything. Which when I attempt to download on my Mac crashes it. Really NBC? As my smarter, professionally techy friend puts it when

I ask him to explain: “I wonder if Microsoft paid them, or if it is more NBC ineptitude.”

Truth be told, I don’t really care. I just want to watch the video (and ideally post it here so that you, too, can behold the Double McTwist awesomeness). No such luck: when I find someone who can actually get to the video they inform me there is no embed code. What is extra infuriating about all this is that I know NBC is not this dumb because they were about a zillion light years ahead of the game when they started posting embeddable clips of SNL in the Fall of 2008. Which as both a blogger and a fan I was happy to watch and go out of my way to embed…advertisements and all. Can someone please explain how in all the gazillion dollars NBC has spent on these Games no one thought to hire an intern to keep an eye on which clips could potentially go viral and then pull them and post them in a usable format with some sort of NBC commercial preroll? I mean, honestly. This is not brain surgery.

** Actually, Brian Stelter does explain NBC’s (totally idiotic) thinking when it comes to livestreaming events, here. You can read the rest of the NYT‘s still-by-still coverage of White here. Also, if anyone out there is able to find a video of this I can actually

watch, please let me know. In the meantime here is a video of White’s McTwist from another event. WOW.

UPDATE: Thanks Twitter! I think this is the vid we are looking for!
Tags: 2010 Olympics, Brian Stelter, Internet, NBC, Shaun White, Twitter