February 19, 2010 NBC Microphones Pick Up More Than They Hoped For By BILL CARTER NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/sports/olympics/19nbc.html?ref=business&pagewanted=print NBC got the best — and worst — of intimate commentary during its coverage of the Olympics on Wednesday night, thanks to some strategically placed microphones. The network was able to bring viewers in on perhaps the most emotionally spontaneous moment of the Games when the triumphant American downhill skier Lindsey Vonn rushed into the arms of her husband and coach, Thomas Vonn, and exploded into joyous sobs. The moment — and their full conversation — was captured by NBC’s audio: every sob, every word of encouragement and even the smack of their lips as the couple kissed before she went off to be interviewed. A couple of hours later, a microphone caught another conversation just as clearly between American coaches and the halfpipe snowboard star Shaun White, who had already clinched a gold medal but was being encouraged to take another run just for fun. The encouragement included some spontaneous expletives normally avoided at all costs by broadcast networks. In this case, the conversation was captured live — NBC does not have a delay on its audio feed during its live coverage — and thus could not be edited out. NBC’s announcers apologized immediately for the inappropriate language. In the first case, NBC was directly involved in ensuring that the exchange between the Vonns would be heard in full. Mike McCarley, a spokesman for NBC Sports, confirmed that the network had placed a microphone on Thomas Vonn. “We wanted to be able to capture him yelling encouragement to her as she came down the course,” McCarley said. Then, after she won, the mic provided the extra benefit of capturing the high emotion between the couple. “We just let it run,” McCarley said. At the halfpipe area, none of the coaches were wearing microphones, but NBC has placed boom mics at many locations to pick up as much of the sound from the action as possible (in this case, to capture the schuss of the snowboards heading down the starting point). McCarley said one of those microphones had captured the charged-up comments from the coaches to White, barnyard references and all. But NBC should not be in any danger of repercussions from the comments going out on the air live, as it was in 2003, when the singer Bono dropped a spontaneous expletive live after winning a Golden Globe award. In that episode, NBC was threatened with a fine after the Federal Communications Commission declared broadcasters liable even for unintended live obscene language. But the rules for broadcasters change depending on the hour that certain words are uttered. After 10 p.m., the rules for inadvertent expletives are more lenient. In this case, the verbiage was heard even later, after 11 p.m. -- ================================ George Antunes, Political Science Dept University of Houston; Houston, TX 77204 Voice: 713-743-3923 Fax: 713-743-3927 Mail: antunes at uh dot edu *********************************** * POST TO MEDIANEWS@ETSKYWARN.NET * *********************************** Medianews mailing list Medianews@etskywarn.net http://lists.etskywarn.net/mailman/listinfo/medianews
