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I know. 'Mr.Carta' spouts the most unintelligible, manic drivel.

Let me present the facts: 5 Stadiums were refurbished. 7 Stadiums are brand new. Amongst those 7 brand new Stadiums only 2 stadiums weren't built in the place of an older one. Arena Corinthians - São Paulo. Home of the Almighty Coringão. Arena Pernambuco - Didn't exactly replace an old stadium but one of the teams that will play in there abandoned their old stadium (a Mall will be built in its place, IIRC). So yeh, the WC added to Brazilian Fooball Economics an incredibly surplus of ONE, UNO, UM stadium. Amazing, ain't it? Remember: no opinion involved until now. Only the FACTS. Onto the second part of your post, the part about the White Pachyderms: Since it's just a prediction I have to abandon the facts for now. But I believe at least 2 of those stadiums could be considered White Elephants, Manaus and, surprisingly, Natal. Natal have a bigger football fanbase, problem is at least for now the big teams don't want to play there. Cuiabá wont be a whilte elephant because, as Mr. Bezzi pointed out, after the removal of the temporary stands it'd just a 20k stadium. The city needs a Convention Center, the least. ----------------- Back to the facts: Right now 6 stadiums are ready and 6 are still in construction. Of those 6 stadiums, 4 are already in the hands of the Private sector. Maracanã - Odebrecht / IMG Mineirão - Minas Arena Arena Pernambuco - Odebrecht Fonte Nova - OAS/Odebrecht Considering the Stadiums that are still in construction 3 of those are already Private Property, 2 Are the supposedly White Elephants, IMHO. And the other is Cuiabá, but after it'll be a small a smallish stadium. 100 world cups? WTF is this ****? We can and will host one World Cup. Syndicates are protesting because they're syndicates, lol. You probably don't know much about it because you live in America. Now if you're implying their salary is/was impacted by the World Cup then you aren't very smart Brazil government works under a budget and laws, none of the money used in the WC could legally be used to pay their salaries. lol. They wanted publicity and they got publicity, that's it. If you can't understand how strikes works, even if you're American, then... Unfortunately we live in a capitalist world, thx USA, sorry URSS. Fortunately we live in a democracy. Thousand of illegal Squatters are removed and allocated in other areas every year, with or without the WC. If you search for news about International Amnesty, you'll see dozens of these news in the past. It's just that you couldn't care less about the Squatters, so you only heard about them because of the WC. Maybe if the US of A / Europe revoked their illegal subsidies on Agriculture those people could have stayed on the small cities where they were born, working there with the Agro Business instead of having to go to big metropolis to find a Job and having to settle in despicable locations That's absurd. The idiotic journalist said there'd be 10 thousand of empty seats on games like it happened in SA 2010. And that's just stupid. The Stadiums will have a 92%+ Occupancy Rate. Now if you still can swallow the facts, then... Well,at least it's not our fault! We tried.

I agree about Atlanta, but some parts of London made the 1996 OC look like a masterpiece (and i 'm not american). Especially Frank & June was the most unwatchable OC segment ever (imo).

I don't think many people have a beef against Russia. Yes, FIFA could've made it clearer if they really wanted a new land, especially for the European cup. That would've saved many of the bids (including England) a lot of time, effort, money, & grief if FIFA had made their intentions clear at the start instead of making them evident at the end. Unlike Qatar, Russia's bid made sense on a purely footballing level (the laws of Russia are another story), with them being an ex-power quickly rising in the football world, and emotionally, with the whole new area of Eastern Europe never having hosted. Not to mention that Russia can (& will) play the event at the right time of year. The problem is Qatar, their lack of football, their status as a city-state smaller than many American states, their climate, and their backward stance on almost every possible issue. It all adds up to a scenario that seems to get more & more likely every day - that instead of going through a fair, level, transparent bidding process back in 2010, Qatar simply went to the FIFA voting committee, & in the words of another member here, 'bought the World Cup'.

Oslo's in Europe, but it's not in France, Germany or Italy. Therefore, by a process of elimination, it must be in the UK (probably a far-flung part of Scotland).

If you read the technical report you will see that the England bid was stronger than Russia. The Executive Committee ignored the reports.

Exactly! I'm confused by some of the responses to your post given that you're from Oslo and not a Brit. Very bizarre! At the very least your post further diminishes the myth that some here like to peddle that this ceremony was only enjoyed by Brits, but we get fingers in ears and accusations of lack of objectivity when people point out this isn't true. Thanks Athensfan for reminding me why I've given this thread a wide berth for a while.

To make the brillant post from Catra even more complete, the map of availability of tickets for Brazil World Cup, after first phase of orders. Green means that category in stadium was not full filled... Red means sold out. And USA Today is worried about empty seats? C'mon... Cuiaba and Manaus... Athensfan, listen more to Brazilians, when subjects are related to Brazil... It's a better shot. I already tried to explain this to people from other countries here, SEVERAL TIMES. We don't have budgets approved like in the USA. Our budget is guaranteed by law. Education and Healthcare will get each at least 6% of the national taxes, whatever it happens in the Universe... That's why you'll never see a US-like government shutdown in Brazil... This is impossible under Brazilian law. Changing subject a little... Brazilian National Team T-Shirt for WC 2014 already leaked! I loved it! Simple and beautiful, without weird stripes or other graphical elements.

Who's lost objectivity? I reckon we're not talking about Lillehammer:-) The ceremony was extremely well received around the world, having read up on wikipedia and as this thread has documented, it has won loads of prizes and nominations. That's a pretty good (objective) suggestion that it was actually a very good show.

Uhm, well that it was only enjoyed in britain was the statement that I disagreed with, so when you represent my view with a statement completely opposite to reality, it's not surprising that you fail to recognize the reasoning. It was not exclusive at all. Sometimes, a director or writer just has to say, okay if you didn't get that, that's alright, but it's not my problem. Or else we could just watch two hours of fireworks display; I'm sure that would please everybody... It turns out, Boyle's show was very well received. The "problem" here is not that it was for the british only (it was not), but that it took the story telling part a bit more seriously, which is completely expected when you hire someone who excels in that department. And it was a great thing to do, for it gave the ceremony a human touch, made it cheaper to produce and in the end, substance outlasts pure flashy-ness. That it didn't please everybody is just the way it is. Sometimes, the lowest common denominator isn't the only way, even for an olympic opening ceremony.

No You creates a straw-man version of Schola's reasoning: "It wasn't enjoyed outside of the native country; but it's OK because it was made for the natives, etc., etc." which was exactly the opposite of what Schola was actually saying (that his non-British nation seemed greatly to enjoy the 2012 OC). NB: creates=created

Some say that about the IOC, too. But I don't see blatantly coming out with such a process as a solution. Thing is, doesn't FIFA have kind of a rule now that the same continent can't host twice in a row for the World Cup. And as far as soccer is concerned, the U.S. is still a "new land" for the sport. I think it's debatable, at the very least, that a World Cup in the U.S. would take the sport to a whole new, much bigger level. And a 2022 U.S. World Cup would've been a game changer for the sport here in this country. The U.S. just didn't offer enough cold, hard cash for FIFA's 2022 vote.