334 replies to this topic

[Durban Sandshark]

I wished I could delve more about the Dick Ebersol resignation as I promised. But I got busy in this time span. Now that's over. However I since elected to deal with that at a later time, more so alligned with my thoughts on NBC's possible London coverage soon. Like, what kind of role will Versus, Universal Sports, and Telemundo will play in this? Will we see the return of the Olympic Basketball and Soccer channels from Beijing (I think we will)? How about their Internet plans? Will we go with the restrictive DIRECTV and Dish Network plans like we had with Vancouver? These are just some of the numerous questions we will ponder as time goes by

Don't get much stuff about Cuba regarding their Olympic television coverage. That in of itself is very interesting. Like to know it's history. What we do know it has been run on the state-run Cuban Institute of Radio and Television with Cuba Vision specifically airing it. London 2012 will be no different. I think there will be full ceremonies and all that with greater coverage towards the Cuban Olympians in the events they're in like in boxing, volleyball, swimming, weightlifting, wrestling, and track and field. I could be wrong about that. Just need the time to do research.

Just found out from Canadian Sports Media's blog when he spotted this interesting tidbit the other day on CTV that the beloved Canadian Official Olympic Media Broadcast Consortium (CTV, TSN, Rogers Sportsnet, RDS, OMNI, APTN, V, OLN, RDS Info Sports, ATN, CTVOlympics.ca, Sportsnet FAN 590 AM) announced its coverage of the 2012 London Olympics will be at least over 5000 hours of Olympics coverage:

Quote

London 2012

From Fall to mid-season, CTV has the best new programming covered. And then we turn our attention to Summer and the biggest event of the year.

London 2012 will be Canada’s greatest Summer Games ever, and Canadians can experience the action, emotion and exhilaration with more than 5,000 hours of coverage, led by CTV’s suite of media assets, including TSN and RDS. CTV will once again deliver the power of choice, giving viewers the opportunity to watch what they want, when they want and how they want.

Whether it’s on television, online or on the go, CTV’s unrivalled storytelling will bring Canada’s dynamic team to the forefront, as Canada is poised for its best medal performance ever at a fully-attended Summer Games. CTV’s robust digital viewing experience includes live coverage, highlights and full replays from the state-of-the-art video player featuring HD and PVR capabilities, as well as on-the-go viewing with mobile devices plus far-reaching social media integration that best serves Canadians’ evolving lifestyle and daily routine.

I'll add more thoughts on Canada's coverage soon.

Macau's TV coverage of the 2012 London Summer Olympics will come from China Central TV (CCTV) with all of the media platforms exclusively used by CCTV, providing a feed to it. Since Macau has a strong Portuguese heritage, it would be wise if CCTV made some Portuguese language coverage for this along with Cantonese and Mandarin.

Speaking of shared Olympic TV coverage in East Asia, both South Korea and that Stalinist amusement park nation to its north, North Korea, will continue to have Seoul Broadcasting System airing the Korean TV rights of the Olympics starting from Vancouver 2010 and up to Rio 2016. All that despite the fact SBS is a private TV network and both Koreas still have very strong political tensions.

[Durban Sandshark]

You know what? I'll actually discuss at least some of the slowly-emerging stuff regarding the CTV-led 5000+ hours of London 2012 Olympic coverage, the first time CTV is involved with the Summer Olympics since the 1992 Barcelona Olympics with Rod Black as the primetime host for the only time. When it was announced back in 2005 the Canadian Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium featuring CTV, TSN, Rogers Sportsnet, RDS, RDS Info Sports, V, APTN, OMNI, ATN, and OLN, projected plans were for the total TV coverage was to be for altogether 2391 hours. The projected breakdown at the time was to be this:

English hours--1756 with 352 from CTV, 304 hours on TSN, 903 from Rogers Sportsnet, and 197 hours out of OLN
French hours--550 including 201 from TQS (now V), 304 out of RDS, and 45 from RDS Info Sports
Multicultural languages hours--100, all from OMNI

It was almost the same amount of planned coverage from Vancouver (1767 combined TV hours there), though obviously London has more hours, all on the English portion. Now we know with the amount of events and the comparable numbers of media hours from the major nations in the Summer Games these days, that was not going be enough. Of course the deal did not actually include APTN, ATN, or Much Music, let alone the Internet streamings for more complete coverage, yet in their plans which displays a desire to make the coverage more multicultural. So I knew there was going to be an increase in TV hours. Almost all the networks here will get an increase in TV hours here for London than originally planned. I think Canada's Olympic media contribution for London will go 5200-5400 hours. So, it will be turn out to become more than double the 2005 planned hours with OMNI, APTN, ATN, and the Internet hours on CTVOlympics.ca and RDSOlympiques.ca.

What gets interesting for me is of the new TV channels emerging since the time of Vancouver, or in the case of TSN2, prior, and what kind of role would and could they play for London as part of the Canadian Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium. I'm talking about the likes of Rogers Sportsnet ONE, TSN2, and A Network, soon to be called CTV Two in time for the 2011-2012 fall TV season, as those become more national. TSN2 has already aired encore presentations of the previous night's primetime coverage of the Vancouver Winter Olympics on TSN, so it has an inside track on that. Those networks can get into a limited amount of Olympic TV hours daily to ease the burden of the anchor channels of CTV, TSN, and Rogers Sportsnet, particularly when the latter networks have the news, Toronto Blue Jays games, and CFL games. Then again, those events broadcast on our primetime come in during London's late night/early morning hours. Haven't heard any plans of a RDS 2. I look forward to see what the breakdown of hours the member networks will get allotted in the 5000+ hours. I'm intrigued how the multilingual channels TV hours will get allotted; it has to be an increase from the 100 hours on OMNI. APTN and ATN will each have to get an increase in Olympic hours for London since amending with a look at Olympic sports with great appeal to those communities like field hockey, shooting, and tennis. Along with aquatics, track and field, basketball, soccer, gymnastics, rowing, tennis, beach volleyball, volleyball, cycling, equestrian, triathlon, and wrestling, French networks like RDS and RDS Info Sports will likely have some focus on the Olympic sports that appeals to the French-Canadian audience like perhaps handball, which has some appeal in Quebec, along with where the Canadian Olympians could participate and medal. Like French-Canadian weightlifter Christine Girard.

I think the structure will be the same as it was in Vancouver with CTV and V acting as hubs for the big events holding "the best of the best", providing the key events and live coverage with the top stories and most significant events at any given time, like every Canadian medal won. And it will have live look-ins of Olympic events from the other channels, directing them to check them out in their entireties. The companion networks will hold key events from start to finish as extended coverage. More complete events and the programming that don't make the TV cut will head towards online through live streaming, likely far more than the 14 concurrent live streams from Vancouver, with live feeds from the networks and from the host feeds every second offering different kind of access, like with athletes that won't make the TV cut in Canada.

As far as the Internet is concerned there, I believe CTV Olympics will have at least 4000 hours of complete London Olympic coverage because I know, since Canada is not as all around in the Olympics sports as we are south of the border. For example, fencing is not as big in Canada with no bonafide Canadian Olympic medal contenders. It would be great to have options to include slow-mo, pause, multi-angles, audio soundtracks, and multilingual options (English, French, Cree, Dene, Mi'kmac, Polish, Cantonese, Mandarin, Ukrainian, Inuktitut, Spanish, German, Mohawk, Bangla, Punjabi, Hindi, Urdu, Italian, Gujarati, Korean). It would help with the languages that did not make it to Vancouver like German and Spanish. I wonder if CTV could emulate NBC in that there could be basketball and soccer channels. Much Music will very likely stay at home, though it could get the feed of the London Olympic concerts.

Also, I noticed on the CTV Olympics Facebook page there are some photos of CTV Olympic shoots of Canadian Olympic hopefuls like Perdita Felicien, Carol Hunyh, Mary Spencer, Sam Effah, and the synchronized swimming duo of Marie-Pier Boudreau Gagnon and Elise Marcotte. Surely there will be more Canadian Olympic hopefuls to be involved in this. Something tells me they are the start of a new batch of Believe TV promos to start CTV's London 2012 coverage campaign. Will we see the French language ones? Some of them may not be though since a few of them are for the Superbodies. London Calling already has profiles up like the aforementioned Girard and trampoline's Karen Cockburn already at TSN.ca's website. Furthermore, there was a recent CTV UpFront gathering to help promote the upcoming fall/winter 2011-2012 TV schedule that featured four Canadian Olympic medalists from Beijing.

[Durban Sandshark]

For the BBC, obviously London 2012 will be the greatest media project ever in its existence with the multitude of media platforms and technologies at its disposal from the Internet streams, TV, digital TV, HD, 3D, cell (or mobile, if you prefer) phone platforms, Freeview, iPlayer, smart interactive TVs, radio, smart phone apps, you get the picture. Just think back to a decade ago when things were just starting out technologically. British residents will get the whole enchilada this time around. 5000+ hours, every minute and every second of the Games will be recorded as it happens in every event. Before Interactive TVs hit, the BBC had 250 hours on BBC One and BBC Two. With Athens and Freeview's Red Button interactive arrival, the coverage jumped to over 1000 hours. And it just kept rising with the hours from Beijing with the Internet streams from Eurovision playing a significant role with 2500 hours. Meanwhile, the coverage on the two BBC channels stayed status quo at 250-330 together. Surely with this, the BBC is looking at social networking sites in their services in unique ways. Also, look for them to apply BBC iPlayer sports apps on the Playstation 3 and the Wii in terms of what they can do.

Ever followed what ZDF's and ARD's coverage of both the Winter and Summer Olympics? Whenever you looked at their TV schedules, those two channels would in their blocks of Olympic programming with the recent exception of those digital channels of EinsPlus, ZDFinfokanal, ZDFdocukanal, and Eins Festival, you would not get the entire events from start to finish, save for the 100m sprints in track or the men's gold medal volleyball, basketball, soccer matches, to give a couple examples. So apparently both (and Australia's 7 in Athens, Torino, and Beijing) continued on what the likes of NBC and CBC abandoned as they started using sister networks for coverage: bouncing around. On a previous list on Wikipedia for London 2012, Germany had Sky Deutschland as part of the London 2012 coverage. The list since was revised with that excised. If it becomes official that Sky Deutschland is part of the broadcast team, it would be great because Germans don't have to deal with jumping around the Olympic events coverage. It can emulate what FOXTEL, Sky Sport New Zealand, Nova Sport, and Supersport did with getting events in their entirties on multiple channels (at least 8 each for both SD and HD) with their own set of Olympic commentators at London's IBC. But if that happens, what would become of the ARD and ZDF digital channels' Olympic coverage. Chances are, they'll stay with no audio commentary at all like with Vancouver. Remains to be seen though how. It must be noted that DSF (now Sport1) did air a handful of events like a couple of Olympic ice hockey games in Torino.

Speaking of Supersport, I sincerely hope that SABC learned their lesson in how it debased the Vancouver coverage in just giving mostly the highlights daily and both ceremonies to not just in South Africa but across sub-Saharan Africa. I've already griped about this on the Vancouver thread, so I won't here. Granted, there is that YouTube Vancouver channel that showed the full events from start to finish for them and SABC had the sole media rights for up to London. But the best and most comprehensive coverage came on Supersport with just about every event beamed live and on tape, standard and HD. In some ways, it was perhaps understandable because the company was still finalizing its World Cup 2010 plans, the most ambitious project down there since the advent of television down there in 1976, something that Supersport abundantly showed too. I hope SABC right now is currently negotiating and eventually selling for the satelitte London Olympic rights to Supersport so that it can show for its multiple channels. For SABC Sport's part, just stick to the ceremonies, daily hours blocks of sports (4-7 each), and the highlights shows.

One thing I forgot to speculate on with Canada happens to be a new wrinkle on Canadian radio. The FAN 590 AM, a part of Rogers Sportsnet, did its part of the Vancouver consortium with 150 hours combined in association with radio stations across Canada (Corus Quebec radio had 50 radio hours to coincide with the 800 TV on the four French consortium outlets, including the daily APTN portions). About that new wrinkle: TSN recently launched its own radio flagship station in Toronto called TSN Radio 1050. What kind of role will it have, if any, for London, since TSN IS part of the Canadian Olympic Broadcast Consortium? With the Summer Olympics obviously having far more events than in the Winter, it could share in the coverage with stuff like basketball and some full events where Canada could get involved. We'll see.

I do anticipate that several of the personalities from FOXTEL's Commonwealth Games coverage from Tiffany Cherry, Matt Shirvington, Susie O'Neill, Daley Thompson, and Rachelle Hawkes will return for London. Perhaps Ruby Rose could commentate on BMX biking there like she did with snowboarding. FOXTEL will have to have at least eight channels each for HD and standard. That's double for Vancouver and Commonwealth. Will each channel have names for London areas like Vancouver did?

[Durban Sandshark]

Nine and FOXTEL took some grief from critics down in Australia from its Vancouver coverage and will no doubt be ready to do likewise when London hits. Sure it still is early for the details--we will get to look at them starting around early next year. Both Nine and FOXTEL would like to avoid the notorious jumping round of coverage like 7 used to do when it held the distinction as "Australia's Olympic Network" up to Beijing with all the bad press accompanying it and raise the standard of broadcasting from what they performed in Vancouver. The Roar has some suggestions as to how to improve:

--make the joint sportscasters on Nine Network/FOXTEL from the respective sports be spot on, educate the viewers as well as themselves on the Olympic rules and the Olympians they are covering
--have all or most Olympics events televised LIVE on free-to-air (Nine in this case), not just selected events
--no Dim Sum-like morning show like in Beijing, probrably can't happen anyway with competition like the big swimming events being in the Australian morning and would like to get those live
--don't be so Australian-centric in medal ceremonies, show them ALL (could eat up some time meant for other sports)
--interview and profile Olympians from other nations, not just Australians (will be hard because the nations' broadcasters get first dibs on them and time constraints)
--keep the Australian bias to a minimum

But wishes like these are more suited for FOXTEL with its array of programming, since Nine Network would like to maintain interest to the general Australian public in their coverage. So it will be Australian in its bias. Nine will cover, consequently, events with great Australian interest because many viewers down there are not quite Olympic junkies, just casual viewers. And will continue to do so. However, I do think Nine will air something like 20-24 hours a day devoted to the Olympics with minimal jumping. With FOXTEL getting involved, there's that option to see events truly from start to finish.

The Roar's Suggestions to Nine and FOXTEL for London 2012

Been thinking lately about how NBC Universal will divide the sports for its London 2012 coverage from each network. Will speculate soon

The Beeb commissions Mammoth and deltatre to produce live and innovative visual television broadcast Olympic graphics, as well as providing operating staff, equipment, and technical support for live and non-live Olympic events. Like to see how those will shape up
http://www.insidethe...tre-and-mammoth

[Quaker2001]

Durban Sandshark, on 15 June 2011 - 08:13 PM, said:

--make the joint sportscasters on Nine Network/FOXTEL from the respective sports be spot on, educate the viewers as well as themselves on the Olympic rules and the Olympians they are covering
--have all or most Olympics events televised LIVE on free-to-air (Nine in this case), not just selected events
--no Dim Sum-like morning show like in Beijing, probrably can't happen anyway with competition like the big swimming events being in the Australian morning and would like to get those live
--don't be so Australian-centric in medal ceremonies, show them ALL (could eat up some time meant for other sports)
--interview and profile Olympians from other nations, not just Australians (will be hard because the nations' broadcasters get first dibs on them and time constraints)
--keep the Australian bias to a minimum

Gee, now why do those complaints sound so familiar. Could be talking about NBC and we'd be seeing the exact same things, just replace "Australians" with "Americans."

[Durban Sandshark]

Quaker2001, on 15 June 2011 - 11:29 PM, said:

Gee, now why do those complaints sound so familiar. Could be talking about NBC and we'd be seeing the exact same things, just replace "Australians" with "Americans."

Yeah, sure does sound familiar to us Americans regarding our NBC coverage over the years. I remember reading back in 2000 how the Sydney 2000 coverage on 7 and C7 Sport was so jingoistic. Don't get it wrong to those who aren't aware: it really isn't about wanting to see our athletes perform well. Surely, there will be greater options for the globalism with the Internet and TV, so we no longer have that as an excuse, unless one can't afford the access.

[Durban Sandshark]

A little clarification (or assumption, if you will) pertaining to the CTV tidbit of the London 2012 coverage, the 5000+ hours is likely going to be combined among the English, French, and multilingual TV entities with English getting the majority share. The BBC will air 5000+ hours of its coverage on various platforms, though I don't see why CTV and company will not do the same for all of the languages. If it is largely reserved for the Internet streams, this could be where the 5000 hours could get in play. Still, something to ponder as we go along while awaiting more info.

I did a breakdown of the sports NBC's family of networks from Athens and Beijing a couple of days ago, under the current format, which I'll get to next time. Despite the expansion of TV hours from Athens to Beijing in terms of their respective TV schedules, NBC's Beijing coverage on TV in comparison, according to its schedule, failed to air judo, taekwondo, and sailing. All of which were on Bravo when it was a part of the Athens coverage. Of course, the NBC Olympics' website did provide them. We'll see with its London schedule.

Universal Sports just struck a multiyear deal with DIRECTV to become a part of the DIRECTV's sports lineup, effective in September with a free preview in August. What kind of role Universal Sports will play in the Olympic coverage for London, Sochi, Rio, and beyond is currently unclear. Actually, because Universal Sports is not a wholly-owned entity of Comcast-NBCU, it can't air Olympic footage itself during them. In Vancouver, it acted like a junior partner of sorts by showing Meet the Olympic Press, Olympic daily news/highlights/reviews and previews shows, medal ceremonies, and live updates with on-site commentary without direct coverage of the competition. So I expect more of the same in London. Much of the attention recently is actually towards these days to Versus, and of NBC's serious plans to rebrand it.

Surely the BBC, with its London rights, will seriously plan to have 3D Olympic coverage in movie theatres, like right now with Wimbeldon. And what kind of coverage would the Brits get in cinemas across the UK from the BBC like special tickets and access to catering like with CTV during Vancouver? Soccer, track, diving, swimming, basketball, and both ceremonies, for sure. Maybe both the BBC and CTV are exchanging ideas right now. Moviegoers can request an option for either standard or 3D in their viewing.

[gotosy]

Olympics chiefs approve Twitter use at London 2012

Athletes at the London Olympics will be allowed to blog and post on Twitter but could be thrown out if their musings breach guidelines.

Competitors may write only "first-person, diary-type" entries but should not act as reporters, International Olympic Committee (IOC) guidelines say.

All social media activity must respect the Olympic Charter, which bans political demonstrations.

Postings deemed to be for commercial purposes will not be permitted.

The guidelines, which were highlighted by the Australian Olympic Committee on Monday after initially being published on the IOC website, explain that the IOC "actively encourages and supports athletes... to take part in 'social media' and to post, blog and tweet their experiences".

But the IOC cautioned that the accreditations of "any organisation or person... may be withdrawn without notice" if its guidelines are breached.
2012 social media etiquette
Continue reading the main story

Postings must:

* "be dignified and in good taste"
* "not contain vulgar or obscene words or images"

Source: IOC

Athletes will be able to upload still photographs taken at venues - a practice which was mostly banned in Beijing in 2008 - but will not be allowed to sell or distribute them for other purposes.

The broadcast of video and audio taken inside Olympic venues will be banned but athletes may post videos taken elsewhere.

Athletes will not be able to use the official Olympics symbol, and any reference to the word "Olympic" must be factual and "not associated with any third party or any third party's products or services".

Internet domain names and URLs including the word "Olympic" or "Olympics" will not be allowed either, unless approved by the IOC.

The perils of Twitter postings made headlines in June when there was a very public disagreement between triple-jump world champion Phillips Idowu and the head of UK Athletics, Charles van Commenee.

Idowu angered Van Commenee by using the micro-blogging site to reveal he was pulling out of the European Team Championships.

Van Commenee responded by saying that "these things are done personally, there are certain channels you have to follow".

http://news.bbc.co.u...12/13927076.stm

[Durban Sandshark]

...And now, straight from our buddy here on these boards, Canadiansportsfan, the CTV Olympics London 2012 logo! Nice, isn't it? Interestingly, we are not yet seeing this logo at CTV's website, on its press releases, TV promos, or even on its Facebook page. No surprise that it's the same structure like Vancouver's with the maple leaf, only it morphs to the Union Jack, the only commonality to NBC's logo. After all, Britain birthed Canada and are Commonwealth members. He plans to reveal more Olympic coverage and other Olympic-themed thoughts as we get to the one-year mark to London 2012 in July and on to London itself from his blog. Looking forward to read them all!



Brian Williams, Catriona Lemay Doan, James Duthie, Rod Black, Holly Horton, Darren Dutchyshen, Michael Landsberg, Jennifer Hedger, Evanka Osmak, Richard Garneau, Dave Randorf, Don Taylor, Claude Mailhot, Martine Gaillard, Brad Fay, RJ Broadhead, Rod Smith, Pierre Houde, Jean Page, Chantal Machabee, Sara Orlesky, Stephane Langdeau, Jaime Campbell, Claudine Douville, Rod Faulds, Frederic Plante, Gino Reda, Katherine Dolan, Jay Onrait, Michel Lacroix, Farhan Lalji, Daniel Aucoin, Louis Bertrand, Denis Casavant, and Michel Y. Lacroix will all return, I expect. The analysts who will team up with them will be interesting. I can see some examples. 1996 gold medalist Donovan Bailey can provide the analysis on the track with maybe Greg Joy on the field events. If Canada doesn't qualify for men's basketball, national team coach Leo Rautins would act as their Doug Collins. For the women's games, if not current coach Allison McNeill, perhaps Stacey Dales or Bev Smith. Women's water polo could have Waneek Horn-Miller, who may actually serve double duty as the London host for APTN along with that. For any wrestling, I can see Daniel Igali. For the pool, I can look at among Joanne Malar, Mark Tewksbury, Alex Baumann, and Annie Ottenbrite. For synchronized swimming, Sylvie Frechette can be called on, though it's more likely she could do that post for RDS/RDS Info Sports/V(TQS) on the French portions. Since Elfi Schliegel works south of the border, despite being Canadian, for NBC's gymnastics coverage, the CTV team may go with Stella Umeh, Lori Fung, and Kyle Shewfelt (don't know if he's still competing). Women's soccer can turn to Charmaine Hooper or, far more likely, the recently retired Kara Lang, who's currently doing the CBC/Rogers Sportsnet's coverage of the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup with Gerry Dobson and Craig Forrest right now. Men's soccer may turn to Pat Onstead, Bobby Lenarduzzi, Carl Valentine, (provided if thier Vancouver Whitecap duties don't stop them), Frank Yallop, or Paul Peschulido, among others. Williams and Lemay Doan are already going to be for both ceremonies. For men's boxing, Lennox Lewis, who won for Canada gold in 1988, could very well be a surprise. I don't know ehere Sean O'Sullivan's whereabouts are. Michel Fervac-Larose, a noted extreme sports caster can provide the BMX biking Olympic call on RDS reteaming with Benoit Ouellette. Diving on RDS/V can have Anne Montimity with her analysis, unless the English portions get her first.

A couple of people I'm not certain about lies with CTV National News anchors, Lloyd Robertson and Lisa Laflamme. I can assume both will be there in London with Robertson doing both ceremonies with Williams, so he can have a role. It's the new CTV National News anchor Laflamme that I'm not certain about yet. She was a co-anchor on CTV Olympic Morning and likely won't do that in London with her new job. I do think that, if CTV wants, have their news set in London to allow Laflamme to be a part of it. Tamara Taggart may be a part of the reporting team for London. Dan O'Toole, Sean McCormick, and Onrait can repsie their Sportsnet Connected and Sportscentre roles for London. James Cybulski could be there along with Marci Ien, Beverley Thompson, Jeff Hutcheson, and Seamus O'Regan. There will be some fluff entertainment pieces, so perhaps we could see the eTalk people, mostly at prime time or late night. For the French coverage, Marc Labrecque and Anik de Repentigny can return as reporters for London on the RDS networks.

Largely speculation for now, which is very interesting north of the border. Now where are those London 2012 "Do You Believe" vignettes?

[Durban Sandshark]

...And now, straight from our buddy here on these boards, Canadiansportsfan, the CTV Olympics London 2012 logo! Nice, isn't it? Interestingly, we are not yet seeing this logo at CTV's website, on its press releases, TV promos, or even on its Facebook page. No surprise that it's the same structure like Vancouver's with the maple leaf at the bottom seemingly rising like a sun, only it morphs into the Union Jack, the only commonality to NBC's logo. After all, Britain birthed Canada and are Commonwealth members. He plans to reveal more Olympic coverage and other Olympic-themed thoughts as we get to the one-year mark to London 2012 in July and on to London itself from his blog. Looking forward to read them all!



Brian Williams, Catriona Lemay Doan, James Duthie, Rod Black, Holly Horton, Darren Dutchyshen, Michael Landsberg, Jennifer Hedger, Evanka Osmak, Richard Garneau, Dave Randorf, Don Taylor, Claude Mailhot, Martine Gaillard, Brad Fay, RJ Broadhead, Rod Smith, Pierre Houde, Jean Page, Chantal Machabee, Sara Orlesky, Stephane Langdeau, Jaime Campbell, Claudine Douville, Rod Faulds, Frederic Plante, Gino Reda, Katherine Dolan, Jay Onrait, Michel Lacroix, Farhan Lalji, Daniel Aucoin, Louis Bertrand, Denis Casavant, and Michel Y. Lacroix will all return, I expect. The analysts who will team up with them will be interesting. I can see some examples. 1996 gold medalist Donovan Bailey can provide the analysis on the track with maybe Greg Joy on the field events. If Canada doesn't qualify for men's basketball, national team coach Leo Rautins would act as their Doug Collins. For the women's games, if not current coach Allison McNeill, perhaps Stacey Dales or Bev Smith. Women's water polo could have Waneek Horn-Miller, who may actually serve double duty as the London host for APTN along with that. For any wrestling, I can see Daniel Igali. For the pool, I can look at among Joanne Malar, Mark Tewksbury, Alex Baumann, and Annie Ottenbrite. For synchronized swimming, Sylvie Frechette can be called on, though it's more likely she could do that post for RDS/RDS Info Sports/V(TQS) on the French portions. Since Elfi Schliegel works south of the border, despite being Canadian, for NBC's gymnastics coverage, the CTV team may go with Stella Umeh, Lori Fung, and Kyle Shewfelt (don't know if he's still competing). Women's soccer can turn to Charmaine Hooper or, far more likely, the recently retired Kara Lang, who's currently doing the CBC/Rogers Sportsnet's coverage of the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup with Gerry Dobson and Craig Forrest right now from Germany. Men's soccer may turn to Pat Onstead, Bobby Lenarduzzi, Carl Valentine, (provided if thier Vancouver Whitecap duties don't stop them), Frank Yallop, or Paul Peschulido, among others. Williams and Lemay Doan are already going to be for both ceremonies. For men's boxing, Lennox Lewis, who won for Canada gold in 1988, could very well be a surprise. I don't know ehere Sean O'Sullivan's whereabouts are. Michel Fervac-Larose, a noted extreme sports caster can provide the BMX biking Olympic call on RDS reteaming with Benoit Ouellette. Diving on RDS/V can have Anne Montimity with her analysis, unless the English portions get her first.

A couple of people I'm not certain about lies with CTV National News anchors, Lloyd Robertson and Lisa Laflamme. I can assume both will be there in London with Robertson doing both ceremonies with Williams, so he can have a role. It's the new CTV National News anchor Laflamme that I'm not certain about yet. She was a co-anchor on CTV Olympic Morning and likely won't do that in London with her new job. I do think that, if CTV wants, have their news set in London to allow Laflamme to be a part of it. Tamara Taggart may be a part of the reporting team for London. Dan O'Toole, Sean McCormick, and Onrait can repsie their Sportsnet Connected and Sportscentre roles for London. James Cybulski could be there along with Marci Ien, Beverley Thompson, Jeff Hutcheson, and Seamus O'Regan. There will be some fluff entertainment pieces, so perhaps we could see the eTalk people, mostly at prime time or late night. For the French coverage, Marc Labrecque and Anik de Repentigny can return as reporters for London on the RDS networks.

Largely speculation for now, which is very interesting north of the border. Now where are those London 2012 "Do You Believe" vignettes?