Roy PANAGIOTOPOULOU

　　Roy PANGIOTOPOULOU

　　Professor，Department of Communication and Media Studies, University of AthensHer

　　Research Fields: Political behaviour and political culture, social classes and social change in Greece, regional television, new technologies and new media, volunteerism and the Olympic Games.

　　Main Publications: Communication in Organizations, Regional Television in Greece;

　　Editor of the book The 'Construction' of Reality and the Mass Media

　　New Trends in Mega Sporting Events

　　Roy PANAGIOTOPOULOU

　　In the last decades, the interconnection of the media and sports has been intensified. In effect, sports organizers seem to follow the imperatives of the media, since their revenues have become largely depended on the TV rights. These conditions raise the demands of the television networks for technologically perfect audiovisual production and for the assurance of ideal working conditions for journalists and technicians. Incidentally, continuous improvements in communication technology create new needs that involve the frequent replacement of infrastructure and technological equipment and make the organization of mega television sports events very costly and difficult operation. The Olympic Games and the Soccer World Cup are the sport events par excellence, which attract the worldwide interest of viewers.

　　The improvement of the various new technological facilities in receiving information and image have improved shooting and viewing conditions and, thus, they have made the TV watching of these mega sporting events an exiting experience. Although, the old observation -claiming that there is a considerable difference between the attending a sport event in the stadium and watching it on the TV- has not been rejected, it has decreased with respect to the technological dimension. New technological devices (internet, video streaming, bloggs, mobile telephony, IPTV, YouTube etc) have sustained spectators’ initiatives.

　　Up to now, the Olympic Games may be an exception of this trend. This is because they offer the possibility for as many citizens as possible to participate in different areas of activity in their organization and realization. This is one of their main characteristics and, in effect, it keeps the Olympic Movement alive.

　　The new ways of watching mega sporting events have caused a new issue, i.e., as to what extent the future of the Olympic Games or relevant mega events (e.g. the Soccer World Cup) will be able to ensure the large numbers of attendants as they used to do in the 1980s and 1990s. The case of Athens 2004 Games might be a silent indication of a future transformation in the field.

　　This may lead to a ‘silent’ devaluation of the Games regarding their social legitimacy. On the other hand, the technological infrastructure and the relevant requirements have become more and more demanding. The question, therefore, is whether in the post-modernity, we have entered the age that the mega sporting TV events have reached their limit. This paper aims to discuss this issue and to exploit possible trends in this direction.

　　Keywords: new media mega events Olympic Games TV coverage participation