NBCUniversal's Paris Summer Olympic Press Release Is A Cautionary Example Of Poor Writing
For the Olympic Family, July 26 will be a special day to be celebrated because in exactly one year the Paris Summer Olympic Games opening ceremonies will commence. It also will mean that sponsors of the game will soon promote their “rose colored” propaganda-laden various promotions. Not mentioned, of course, will be the many controversies that have been reported regarding the games in “the City of Lights.” (More on this later.)
To all the businesses associated with the games, and especially to the network televising the games in the U.S. - NBCUniversal - the Paris Olympics will be the most important happening since humans appeared on our planet.
Multitudes of over-the-top promotional press releases are certain to reach editor’s desk as the games grow closer. (Over-the-top: extremely or excessively flamboyant or outrageous, according g to Merriam-Webster dictionary.) And as in the past, most will be relegated to the trash basket. Thus far, the most over-the- top press release that I saw was issued by NBCUniversal on May 11. It reminded me of an ad written by used car salesmen trying to convince people that a pre-certified car was only driven by the proverbial little old lady, or those TV commercials for health products that in small print say, “These Statements Have Not Been Evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration.” (You can be certain that many sponsor’s press releases promoting their campaigns will follow suit.)
The release said, in part, “With 14 months until the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad begin, NBCUniversal announced today that the NBC broadcast network and streaming service Peacock will be the company’s primary platforms for its coverage of the Olympic Games Paris 2024, scheduled for July 26-Aug. 11, 2024.
“Every day, NBC will provide Olympic fans with at least nine hours of daytime coverage of the Summer Games’ most exciting events, including live finals coverage of swimming, gymnastics, track & field, and more. With Paris six hours ahead of the United States’ eastern time zone, the daytime takeover will feature that day’s most popular events live on NBC in the morning and afternoon. Paris 2024 will have more programming hours on the NBC broadcast network than any previous Olympics.”
So far so good. Newsy and journalistic writing containing hard news information. But not for long.
In the same press release, Pete Bevacqua, Chairman, NBC Sports, said, “For those wanting to watch the competition as it happens, Peacock will have everything live, creating the greatest single destination in sports media history. From the spectacular landmarks of Paris to the world’s greatest athletes performing in front of full stadiums and arenas for the first time in six years, viewers can expect one of the most extraordinary Olympics ever….”
Also quoted was Kelly Campbell, President, Peacock and Direct to Consumer, NBCUniversal. “Peacock is bringing the rich history of these incredible Games to our viewers like never before, providing unparalleled and unprecedented access to one of the world’s greatest sporting events.”
The release also said that NBCUniversal commenced a “Save The Date” campaign in which “Musical legend Dolly Parton, the Minions, and WWE superstar Roman Reigns and his special counsel Paul Heyman star in a promotional video in which they are offered unbelievable opportunities next summer only to turn them down because they have already saved the date to watch the Paris Olympics.
(If I would have written a press release that is so promotional with so many adjectives during my agency PR days or in a news article during my days as a journalist before joining the PR business, I would have been fired. And if I would have suggested a promotion saying prominent entertainers are refusing performance dates because they want to see the Olympics on TV, I would have been sent for observation.)
Of course, not mentioned in the NBCUniversal release was the controversy regarding allowing Russian and Belarus athletes to compete or allegations of corruption regarding the games (which is a constant theme each time a new Olympic city host is chosen.)
To read the NBCUniversal press release a person might think that the controversies of the past that were as much a part of the Olympics as its events had been resolved. But news reports about the Paris Olympics showed that the one constant theme regarding the Paris Olympics was controversy, which was reported by major news sources, even though they didn’t rate one line in the network’s press release.
Articles detailing the controversies by news outlets ranged from a March 4 Associated Press (AP) story regarding ticket sales to on-going articles about the International Olympic Committee (IOC) recommending that athletes from Russia and Belarus be permitted to compete in pre- Olympic qualifying international events as neutrals, opening a door for them to compete at Paris, though their countries might be barred, to threats of boycotts by countries opposed to letting athletes from the war-mongering countries compete.
A few specific examples
On Oct. 22, 2022, The New York Times (NYT) published an article about the planning for the Paris games which was still 20 months away. Then came the barrage of articles highlighting the controversies.
A Times article on Oct. 25 was about the different opinions regarding allowing Russia and Belarusian athletes to compete in the Paris games.
Another Times article on the subject, which also received coverage in numerous other media outlets, was published on Jan. 26, 2023 after the IOC executive board said, “No athlete should be prevented from competing just because of their passport,” despite Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Russia’s long history of state-sponsored doping.
Also on Jan, 26, Agence France Presse (AFP) reported that Ukraine “threatened to boycott the 2024 Olympics in Paris if Russian and Belarusian athletes are allowed to take part, a prospect described as unacceptable by the country's sports minister.”
And on Feb. 3, nationalnews.com reported, “Up to 40 countries could boycott the next Olympic Games, making the whole event pointless, said Poland’s sport and tourism minister Kamil Bortniczuk.” His comments came after Poland, Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia jointly rejected an IOC plan to allow Russians and Belarusians to compete in 2024.
Then the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), on Feb.22, reported that “Russian and Belarusian athletes should continue to be shut out of international sports events, including the Olympics, until there is a way to show they are competing independent of their governments, 34 powerful nations said in a statement signed by the U.K., the U.S. and France, the host of the 2024 Olympics.”
On July 13, the IOC said Russia and Belarus will not get a formal invitation to the 2024 Paris Olympics. But that still left open the door that athletes from those countries could compete despite protests from other nations. (A complete list of negative articles, way to many to list here, regarding the awarding and planning for the Paris Olympics is available on websites.)
By now every reader of this essay knows that the gist of this essay is that when an Olympic site is chosen controversy and charges of corruption follow and the controversies are disregarded by the moguls who run the Olympics, sports marketing sponsors who “just follow the athletes” and NBCUniversal’s Olympics brass.
(Full disclosure: I’ve been a featured speaker at an IOC sports media seminar and have managed or played key roles in Olympic programs, both on the sponsorship side and with organizing committees. But I’ve also never been blind to the short comings of the movement and never defended its unsavory dealings as do sports marketing sponsors and NBCUniversal does by “just following the athletes.” When choosing Olympians for client promotions, I always insisted that they were above reproach. If research turned up anything unsavory about them, I’d veto them. And, when necessary, I said “no” to IOC officials.)
Business people involved with the Olympics are aware, but ignore the allegations of bribery associated with the Paris and past Olympics regarding the awarding of the games. But what bothers me the most is when they remain silent and “follow the athletes,” even when the games are awarded to totalitarian countries that engender war and are devoid of human rights. That’s the line in the sand for me.
A bit of history
In 1936, despite it being known that the Nazis were persecuting Jews, and other people that they considered undesirable, the IOC with backing of the then called American Olympic Committee agreed that Germany should host the Summer and Winter Olympics. The first concentration, camp, Dachau, was constructed in 1933 by Nazi officials and was used as a model for future camps, and in 1935 Germany annexed the Saar region and
reinstituted compulsory military service in violation of the Versailles Treaty. But the American Olympic Committee refused to participate in a boycott of the games held in the totalitarian dictatorship country that had proven by its actions that it was a threat to many of its citizens and world peace.
Even though totalitarian Germany showed its true face before the beginning of the Nazi Olympics, the IOC’s and the American Olympic Committee, despite protests against America’s participation in the games by some U.S. Olympic high-ranking officeholders, religious leaders of all faiths and elected government officials failed to sway “the politics has no place in the Olympics” crowd.
More recently, the IOC, with the backing of the United States Olympic Committee, has not spoken out when the propaganda-rich games were awarded to autocratic governments.
In 1968, the IOC awarded its game to Mexico, despite the country’s single-party authoritarian government. Twice the IOC awarded its games to Russia in 1980 and again in 2014 and another totalitarian government, Yugoslavia, hosted the games in 1984. China was given the 2008 Summer Olympics and the 2022 Winter Beijing Olympics. “Just show us the money” would be an appropriate IOC motto. American sponsors of the Olympics, along with American networks and the United States Olympic establishment showed no shame in helping put a good face on those countries. And that’s a shame.
There were, and have been, many controversies reported in major publications regarding the Paris games that were not worthy of one sentence in the May 11 NBCUniversal press release. NBCUniversal’s sports release should not be considered a journalistic news release. It is an advertisement and is undeniably a prime example of sportswashing. Sites that used the release should send NBC a bill for running their ad.
It would be unrealistic to expect the controversies of the Paris Olympics to be featured in the May 11 or in any future news release about the Paris games that NBCUniversal issues. But NBC is a news station, or so it says, and as such in every release it should mention that the games are not free of controversy and explain how the network will report on them. That could be done in one line. Doing so would not diminish the promotional content in the releases; it would make them more honest and newsworthy.
Negative news on television about the sordid happenings on and off the sports field is only covered when it rates page one print exposure, and the announcers have no choice except to report it. But even then, the coverage is limited, compared to print coverage of the situations.
However, over the years one sports commentator has stood out from the pack. If there was an “Ed Murrow of Sports Broadcasting award,” the perennial winner would be Bob Costas, who is not afraid to speak his mind.
During an interview on CNN’s January 23 Reliable Sources program last year, Costas said, in part, “But the IOC deserves all of the disdain and disgust that comes their way for going back to China yet again. They were in Beijing in 2008. They go to Sochi in 2014. They’re shameless about this stuff.”
Costas refuses to gloss over sports warts. He is sports broadcasting’s prime rival to the most honest and best print sports journalism, which stopped covering up the warts of sports over a decade ago. Sports broadcasting journalism needs more commentators like Costas who have the courage to act as reporters instead of shills, and less “gee whiz wasn’t that a great play” commentators.
On July 18, 2012, The Hollywood Reporter called Bob Costas “The Conscience of NBC Sports.” In my opinion during his four decades at NBC, Bob Costas showed that he is much more than “The Conscience of NBC Sports.” He is the conscience of television sports journalism. He has no peer in television sports coverage in telling the truth and NBC sports commentary has greatly suffered since his departure.
Since Costas left NBC, their coverage of sports events, particularly international ones, is similar to an infomercial. And while the sponsors and host countries might be happy, the viewers are being denied the truth and totalitarian countries are getting a face lift during its Olympic coverage. People in our business are not held in high esteem by the public. We are accused of making the “bad” look “good.” NBCUniversal’s May 11 Olympic press release, which was devoid of the reality of the news regarding the Paris Olympic, proves that those who criticize our craft are correct.
The history of NBCUniversal’s Olympic coverage, along with IOC and the U.S. Olympic powers proves that it if they have to choose between democracy and the games, democracy will be sidelined.
PR lessons to learn
My advice to PR agencies:
Already the 2024 Summer Olympics in France, a democratic country, is coming under attack because of the IOC’s support of Belarus and Russian athletes to participate in the games and the charges of corruption in the awarding of the games. Make certain that your sports marketing account team includes a person who has the background necessary to respond to negative media coverage and not wither under incoming flak, because negative coverage of the games will increase as July 26, 2024, draws closer.
Assigning sports junkies to “normal” sports marketing accounts is not a good idea. Assigning them to Olympic–associated accounts is a major error. Staff the account teams with people who realize that sports is as much a business as any other account that the agency handles. And as I previously advised PR people who represent golf sponsors, start planning your responses for clients that sponsor golf tournaments right now, because it’s a certainty that at some time you’ll need them to respond to reporters’ questions.
The May 11 NBCUniversal press release should be used as a not-to-follow template in PR training sessions because it is too promotional and quotes in the release have so many adjectives that they make 30 second commercials seem newsworthy.
The more promotional a press release is, the less chance it has to be used by major news organizations. The best chance of having your press release picked up by major news outlets is to write it in an AP style news story. That doesn’t assure that the toned down quotes and promotions in the release will be picked up, but it has a better chance of being used than the NBCUniversal press release, which reads like an advertorial.
The above lessons apply to PR practitioners. But there is an aspect of the Paris Olympic Games that is much more important to the general public and to those who cherish truthful journalism: It is how honest will NBCUniversal’s coverage of the games be? In the past, the network has largely kept mum about controversial issues engulfing the games, especially not speaking out about the nature of totalitarian-run countries that were awarded the games.
The 2024 Summer Paris Olympics will be held in a democratic country. There is no reason for NBCUniversal not to speak honestly about the controversies. No reporter will be thrown out of the country or jailed for speaking the truth. Nor will the French government censor the reporting.
In the past, when the Olympic Games were held in totalitarian countries, NBCUniversal’s Olympic coverage camouflaged the warts of the host countries. The question now is will the network act as an honest news source, or, as it has in China, and Russia, as a PR arm of the IOC?
