OLYMPICS BEGIN

First off we want to say we are glad the Olympic Games are starting because we really want to see Trinidad and Tobago's athletes accomplish great things in China.
TV6 has the rights to broadcast the Olympics, but the first few minutes of coverage leave much to be desired.

At 7:33am, Joel Villafana pumped us up and told us he was handing us over live to the Bird's Nest Stadium in Beijing, but what we got instead was a studio shot of Julius Gittens and a Mr Lightbourne inside the CMC studio in Barbados. So no one could have told him that they were going to CMC and not the stadium?
Julius gave a long monologue, then said not only does the Caribbean have a dream team of athletes in Beijing, they also have a dream team of journalists there as well, and he turned us over to Lance Whittaker and two others standing outside the Bird's Nest Stadium.
They were by themselves, all alone like three pieces of cheese. They spoke among themselves about some of the athletes then Lance handed us back over to Julius. Boring. (So there are no Trini sports journalists in that 'dream team'? TV6 owns the rights, couldn't they pull a string to have one of their sportscasters go to Beijing?)
Then when Julius came back from a break, they showed two long speeches from the IOC's Caribbean representatives. Again, boring. Not a shot yet of any of the athletes who will be representing the Caribbean.

Anyway, while over at NBC (Channel 60) at the very same time, Matt Lauer, Ann Curry and Meredith Vieira were interviewing live outside the Bird's Nest stadium some of the American athletes who will be participating in the games. They also had on display some of the new high-tech swimsuits that swimmers will be wearing and they interviewed Olympic medalist Michael Phelps.
So CMC couldn't record a few interviews with athletes ahead of time to show in the first few minutes, or a montage of the athletes representing the Caribbean?

Well the opening ceremony thankfully, finally got underway at the stroke of 8am, saving us from more boring speeches.
Please TV6, use your clout with CMC and tell them we are not impressed so far.

On another note, we notice that TV6 does have a reporter in Beijing after all, Kwame Laurence, a reporter for the Express. We have not seen any video from him, just reports over the phone and archive footage of athletes like George Bovell III.
Hopefully that situation will be rectified within the next few days.
Roger Sant on the other hand had a report in CNC 3's newscast last night which included interviews with the the team's doctor, Dr Ali talking about the fact that the heavy smog has not yet begun to affect the athletes, and we saw shots of some of the athletes out on the streets of Beijing.
Nothing so far from CNMG. Do you have a camera crew in Beijing?
Well we are still watching the opening ceremony.