It’s All About Mobile and Social At The Olympics

I love the Olympics. During the two weeks that they’re on, I’m up way too late and I spend too much time checking results during the day. I never miss opening and closing ceremonies and watching the swimmers and gymnasts just makes my day.

Which is why I’m so happy that NBC and the IOC created mobile apps that let me watch all of the races in real-time or on demand. For the first time, I can watch events that don’t normally get any airtime (like tae kwon do) and I can get as much detail as my heart desires on specific athletes, races and sports.

• I love, love, love NBC’s Live Extra app that lets me watch the events by sport and by day. I was able to get my son to bed with the promise that he could watch Michael Phelps the next morning on the iPad. These videos go beyond the 2 minute highlights on standard news sites. If I want to, I can watch 3 whole hours of swimming finals from each day. There are ads and wait times between races but you can see everything. Amazing. You can also watch Live Extra from your computer.
• The NBC Olympics app on the iPad has results, news, photos and video highlights. This is where I go for results and short videos.
• The London 2012 app is terrific. It will tell you everything going on in London this summer, where to go, and how to get there. You can coordinate meetups with friends and you even create a personal calendar. My friend Sue turned me on to this app and she hopes the city of London will keep this app long after the Olympics are over because it’s a great travel app for local and visitors alike.

There have been all kinds of news stories about how the apps aren’t ready for prime time, NBC is delaying posting the videos, sometimes pages and videos are slow to load, yada, yada. Me, I expect there will be glitches and I’m just grateful that this year’s Olympics are so much more accessible.

The Olympics aren’t just big on mobile devices, they’ve been HUGE on social media. Every morning, when I check my Twitter and Facebook pages, the people I follow are overwhelmingly talking about the Olympics.

• I love this branded Twitter hashtag page for #Olympics.
• I’m enjoying tweets from some of my favorite athletes, even some I never heard of!
• I’m enjoying status updates from the NBC Olympics Facebook page. I’m tracking the events and results elsewhere but it’s fun to read  the comments. There are nearly 650 comments on the post about Michael Phelps winning his 19th medal!

How about you? Are you watching the Olympics on your TV or some type of mobile device? Are you participating in the social media frenzy over the races, results and athletes?