Looking forward to NBC Universal's coverage of the Beijing Olympics in August? You'd better be... because escape will be impossible. The entertainment conglomerate is planning to broadcast 3,600 hours of Olympic programming, far more than has ever been shown before. That's more than 200 hours per day.
And it won't just be on NBC stations, either, but also on USA Network, MSNBC, CNBC, Universal HD, the Spanish-language Telemundo, and even the recently purchased women's channel Oxygen (which will feature female-skewing programming such as tennis and gymnastics highlights). After all that, if there's still any time left in your day, you can also watch streaming events, replays and highlights on the Internet.
Because of the 12-hour time difference from Beijing, NBC plans to air a lot of popular morning events live during prime time, instead of tape-delaying them as in the past. (That's on the East Coast of the U.S., anyway -- West Coast viewers will still get a three-hour time delay, just as they do with the Emmys, the Grammys and Saturday Night Live.) There'll also be constant coverage in the afternoon and late-night hours, just in case you were planning on working or sleeping.
So clear off your schedule, empty out your DVR and get ready for a long month. Either that or find a cave to hide in somewhere to avoid the whole thing. But if you do, make sure it doesn't get cell-phone reception -- because there'll be Olympics programming on those, too.
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