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Looks like Don Mischer is no longer active. I think it will probably be Five Currents.

No, not yet. I imagine any info regarding the handover will be released early next year. I'm regularly looking though, so I'll post if I find anything

Do we know the production company for the handover?

The cauldron itself would have been quite spectacular if it was atop a more slender "pole" instead of an overwrought mass of steel. So over-engineered and ridiculous. And the fact its intentional by an artist is so odd to me. It was the centennial Olympics, if there ever was a time for a Grecian classic bowl style cauldron this was the time.

Well that certainly dealt with that . That's surely the end of the Eddie circus everywhere now, I wouldn't be totally confident about Australia beating Portugal next week on that form. Wales genuine threats to the big 4 for the trophy?

That was such a stupid waste of steel!! Those stairways weren't used at all!! It was the most idiotically conceived "cauldron" plan yet. The Ladies Auxiliary Group of ACOG 3 years before the Games and before they signed Don Mischer Prods to stage the ceremonies, just picked that Ziah Armani out of thin air, and then commissioned him to design and build the cauldron WITHOUT consulting with the eventual Ceremonies producer. I blame that stupid Ginger Watkins and Linda Stephenson for this faux pas.

Well, I thought we’d lose. But that was embarrassing. Credit to Wales, though. Walked all over us.

Trying to think of a group stage game in any sport, not just rugby, that was as intense as that SA v IRE encounter. Blimey. Anyway, nice easy win for England which there is zero point getting carried away about, but it was nice to see us play well for once. Some of those things are not like the others.

Double confusing that the nearby Cross River Rail itself will be closer to the actual definition of a Metro when they are running it at capacity in 2032.

Agree. “Metro” is widely associated with turn up and go trains across many cities worldwide including Sydney as you said and Melbourne, plus many others.

I want Paris 2024 to go full tilt weird. I want that high brow Albertville 1992 puppets back. I want their famous humour and clowning. I want the Daily Mail to hate it. Bring it on!

"Brisbane Metro" is such a silly, provincial name. Its a busway. Sydney Metro, is a Metro...

They're clearly copying Atlanta 1996 by putting the Olympic flame atop of famous and graceful lattice steel structure. Are the French really so unoriginal they need to steal the graceful ideas of previous hosts?

TBH - if the IOC relaxed its fixation on February and allowed an August WOG we could co host with Queenstown. Melbourne could easily stage all the indoor events across its various arenas, and some of the cross country events would be at places like Mount Buller. We'd really only rely on NZ for that more serious slopes for the alpine skiing. Like all WOG prospective hosts its the track infrastructure thats the challenge.

But then another thought - when exactly did the IOC get struct on the July-August hosting? Sydney would be too cold in this time, so its possible that Sydney could have been seriously damaged by this technical requirement. Maybe it could still be Brisbane 2032 with either Melbourne/Sydney 1968?

Also interesting to ponder how that single vote would impact Australia's Olympic hosting to this day. Say 1956 went to Buenos Aires... I doubt we'd have been successful at 1960 or 1964 (the weight of Europe and Japan would have been insurmountable). with 1956 in Latin America, we may have had a good chance at 1968. This could have been either in Melbourne or Sydney (possibly that elusive Moore Park based Olympics). Brisbane really was too small back then. Assuming 1968 is in Melbourne, this leaves Sydney chasing its Olympic dream. Like Melbourne in 1956, Sydney won 2000 by the narrowest of votes. Would the hypothetical 1968 Australian Games, only 25 years prior, be enough to sway two votes to Beijing for 2000? With no Beijing for 2008, it really unlocks a lot of speculation thats too hard to guess. But my theory is that we'd like have a Sydney Games at some point between 2008-2028. That means no Brisbane 2032. Conclusion: we are very lucky to be a three time Olympic host.

In fairness it was the US's fault for not consolidating into a single candidate (which wasn't a requirement back then). Its interesting to reconstruct the 1956 vote with a single US bid in the equation (for discussion purposes I've chosen Los Angeles which got the highest number of votes, put an X for where i've removed American votes). Not a great deal would have changed, except LA would have come third on the first round of voting. HOWEVER it seems like some of that early fragmented American support went to Melbourne and not the Latin American bids. So in effect Melbourne had the support of the British Empire + run off support from pro-American votes (wherever they were coming from). Enough to get us that single vote. Surprising that Montreal was such a non-starter - apparently a pretty poorly put together bid that was diluted with a Winter bid. Even though Melbourne had organisational troubles it was still an amazing Olympics for its time. BA would have had its own issue too with a coup in 1955 doing unknown disruption to organisation (and violence extending into 1956). Melbourne Australia 14 18 19 21 Buenos Aires Argentina 9 12 13 20 Los Angeles United States 10 8 5 — Detroit X X 0 — Mexico City Mexico 9 3 — — Chicago United States X — — — Minneapolis X — — — Philadelphia X — — — San Francisco X — — — Montreal Canada 0 — — —

An enjoyable ceremony. The AR fireworks were nice, better than having no fireworks at all. Also, were those projections on the floor or was it an LED screen?

The throwback in time had feels of Athens 2004

Didn’t know the Olympic Council of Asia had it’s own hymn for their flag raising.

Like ‘Beijing 2008’ 2.0

Thanks so much @Ikarus360, watching it now. Wow, it’s on an Olympic scale.

Nice one Ireland…. So, that’s all the big southern teams being handed a hiding.