For those who watched the opening ceremony, NBC decided to omit this tribute in favor of a Michael Phelps interview.

Here is a link that might be useful: Missing tribute

sis3, thanks for posting that. NBC sucks.

What I did not see was a broadcast of the athletes taking the Olympic oath - this is one of the most important part of the entire ceremony, it is what makes the athlete an Olympian! Shame on NBC for omitting this!! Deplorable!

Shame on NBC, period! Cutting out the British tribute and replacing it with an inane Michael Phelps interview, tape-delaying the major events so you know the results before you can watch it at night in 'prime time' to up their advertising revenue, tape-delaying the Opening Ceremony, plus idiotic talk, talk, talk. The whole thing is a mess. We're only 5 hours behind England, not 15 hours, and the whole world is seeing everything live except us!

I would not have understood the opening ceremony without Matt Lauer explaining it.

No, I'm not watching the Olympics, for all the reasons discussed above. Tedious, over-edited filler between advertisements. I may tune in to see which advertisers I should boycott.

Actually, some of the ads are pretty good. More interesting than the Olympic coverage. (Not the Olympics themselves, just the coverage of them.)

What I dislike is that because everything they show at night is taped, they can drag out one sport by showing it bit by bit, instead of all at once, as it happens. I can't stay up that late.

I enjoyed the opening ceremony with the exception of the last techno/music section that seemed to go on forever.

I thought it was delightfully quirky and totally in keeping with the flavor of the Brits.

And since the opening ceremony generally highlights something about the host country or city (remember the Mormons arriving in Utah at the Salt Lake City Olympics?), it's not unusual that the ceremony requires some explanation.

I'm just wondering if the Tardis is going to show up in the closing ceremony. :)

I'm just wondering if the Tardis is going to show up in the closing ceremony. :)

One can only hope.

I have just been watching bits and pieces of the Olympics, and didn't watch all of the opening ceremony, but I did like the Queen and James Bond. She's really loosening up in her old age.

I really enjoyed watching the girls' gymnastics last night- it is amazing how strong they are! Also how tense they seem- like when they hug each other- I can't imagine how much pressure they are under.

NBC has done a horrible job with the Olympic programming for years, this year they've just out done themselves. It's an atrocity that they refused to broadcast the tribute, their announcers say the dumbest of dumbest things, they're bringing in people (Like Ryan Seacrest) who know nothing about sports to interview and broadcast and a lot of the interesting parts aren't even caught on camera.

During the opening ceremony, they thought it was more important to name all the flag bearers (except for the girl representing the USA of course) and show close ups of them as opposed to viewing some of the great costumes. I was so frustrated by the time it was over because some really cool stuff didn't even get on camera.

No, I haven't so far. I've sort of kept up with the medal count on our local news. They are doing that daily and we have two from our immediate area participating.

tina

No, because of the many issues expressed above. I did watch a bit of the opening.

While the queen may be a good sport, would it have killed her to have offered a smile at the end of the children's choir performance of her country's national anthem? The queen looked as tho someone shoved a half lemon into her mouth and threatened her within an inch of her life should she break the stone cold stare. I think she's really a cold fish.

I so agree with you, 'work'. What the heck was the Queen's problem. She obviously had shown some sense of humor by agreeing to the parachute thingy with Daniel Craig, but she obviously didn't like the Opening Ceremony and was making a statement with her bored and dour demeanor. Maybe when she saw the completed segment of her parachuting she rethought that it was dignified enough for her position.

NBC's taped delayed coverage is an abomination, but I have commented on that before.

I caught the men's cycling road race in a restaurant with other pro cycling fans. We were cheering like crazy for Alexandre Vinokourov. Great fun! We were so happy for our beloved Vino, winning his last road race of his career with his inimitable attacking style. Thanks for all the thrills, Vino, cycling fans will miss you!

When I was watching the opening ceremony and then the interview with MP showed up, I was like, "WTH?" lol It seemed so out of place! Then I found out the next day that they didn't show the tribute.

I'm glued to the Winter Olympics, but not summer. The majority of the men's gymnastic team comes from OU which I find interesting. Of course we are the home of Nadia Comaneci, Bart Connor and Shannon Miller, so I do try to watch some of the gymnastics.

As far as the opening itself, I wasn't a happy camper. I felt like I was watching an infomercial of the "British Invasion" which is on ALL the time here in America on some channel somewhere.

While I love Paul McCartney, since he's so over-exposed it wasn't a treat to me. Why can't poor Ringo do a song? :)

Forgot to add, I heard on the news yesterday that the Queen went to Balmoral during the Olympics. I find that kind of odd.

You all must be in the minority. NBC is reporting their ratings have never been higher. I know it is all we have on evenings. It is such a wonderful change from re-runs on these nights it has been just to hot to be outside. Remember if you are really disappointed in the TV coverage you can always stream off the internet. We are so not "sports fans" at my house but we are fans of the Olympic Games!!! We found the opening ceremony visually interesting and very impressive. The caldron is GENIUS!! So fitting. I wish the parade of countries had more symbolic costuming involved, and it could go twice as fast. Other than that we thoroughly enjoyed it.

I admit I have never enjoyed the Olympics and won't watch even 2 seconds.
However, my Dad has it going morning til bedtime so I do hear quite a bit of it.

We are huge fans of the Olympics. I always have been, though otherwise I am not a tv-sports fan. I too noticed the Queen's sourpuss face -very strange that. I liked the opening ceremonies very much. The events have been fabulous. Last night was my first real disappointment with NBC. I've been scrupulously avoiding the internet and radio, not wanting to know results early. So last night as we are waiting for Missy Franklin to swim, immediately before her race an ad comes on and mentions how, "When you win a gold medal in the Olympics, the first people you want to see is your parents.... " and shows Missy Franklin doing just that! I couldn't believe it! And then the ad finishes, the race comes on, and Missy wins gold.... ugh!

I am watching quite a bit of the Olympics, but we love to watch sports anyways at our house. I enjoy watching some of the sports we never get to see like handball and field hockey.

I taped the opening ceremony and fast forwarded through all the history cr**. Not real interesting to me to be honest. Sortof like Harry Potter meeting Mary Poppins there for awhile!

Anyways, my only comment on the opening ceremony was why did the choose "Hey Jude" as the finale number? "Take a bad song and make it better", Not one word of inspiration in those lyrics. Surely Sir Paul and/or the Beatles had written a more inspiring song they could have played as the ceremony finale. I found it funny when they panned the crowd most of the athletes didn't know the words or weren't even singing along - definitely saw the generation gap with that song!!

I really enjoyed watching the womens gymnastics tonight even though I knew the outcome. They were just spectacular to watch. Great to see that Jordyn Weiber did so well after being so crushed the other day she missed the all-around.

There is a large swim club here and many of those who are in the Olympics have done very well overall, so that is exciting.

I loved watching that too! I got tears in my eyes at the end. It's moments like those that make the Olympics worth watching!

I love watching the Olympics, both winter and summer! I am an opening/closing ceremony junkie, and while some years/countries' ceremonies are more exciting than others, I enjoy ech and every one. Not a sports fan either, per se, but I watch as much of the Olympics as I can (same way with the World Series if NY is in it, and always have to watch the Super Bowl while eating homemade wings and skins!).

I am thoroughly enjoying it this year. DH and I celebrated the start of this year's Olympics by eating fish and chips during the opening ceremonies (DH washed his down with an English beer!) . :-)

I tried to watch some of it at a friend's house, but found the idiotic commentary and interviewers intolerable.
I also still have a bad taste in my mouth re the olympics after they harshly displaced so many people in China. Those actions seem rather contrary to the lofty olympic ideals. They've been chucking athletes left and right this year for tweets, but it's ok to destroy peoples' lives in the name of the olympics. Pfffttt!

Here is a link that might be useful: Chinese Displaced

betsyhac--It was the decision of the Chinese government to evict all those people, not the International Olympic committee. Blame the host country for the evictions.

In contrast, the main stadium for the London Olympics was deliberately placed in a depressed area. They are hoping that it will be used a lot in the future, and will help the economic situation in that area.

I do, but don't you think the Olympic Committee had to have known about it?

On another note, my niece in England tells me that 60,000 volunteers were involved in the opening ceremony. Despite the high level of secrecy required over many months for the ceremony to be a complete surprise on opening night, they were not asked to sign any form of non-disclosure agreement. Not one volunteer leaked any detail of the upcoming ceremony!

While most of the Olympics does not really interest me, Oscar Pistorius, the double amputee, has me fascinated. I hope he wins!