Comments on: YouTube Olympics channel brings games to multiple nations

For countries like the U.S., where exclusive rights to content have been bought, YouTube will use IP geo-blocking to prevent access to the channel.

[benjaminstraight]

Cool. But I remember having to tune in on time to see any of it.

[curtispalmer]

See http://www.flickr.com/photos/techbirmingham/2745489808/ for a screen shot of the YouTube page for Beijing2008

[Antillean]

From the article:

"For the first time in Olympic history we will have complete global online coverage," says Timo Lumme, the IOC's director of television and marketing services.

If by "complete global online coverage" Mr Lumme means that people in every country in the world will have legal access to official coverage, it seems that he's lying. If CCTV.com's list of Internet rights holders for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games (http://www.cctv.com/english/20080806/106217.shtml), the list of countries and territories provided in the IOC's press release (http://www.olympic.org/uk/news/media_centre/press_release_uk.asp?release=2678) and this Caribbean netizen's experience are anything to go by, people accessing the Internet from at least ten independent Caribbean countries and dependent Caribbean territories -- including sprinters Asafa Powell and Usain Bolt's Jamaica -- will be without legal access to official coverage on the Internet.

But that includes only a few million residents and tourists, so perhaps the IOC can afford to not care about us.