Let the (digital) games begin!

Tagged as: O.P.E.N., creative, digital millennials, engaging, iCitizen, mobile, networked, new consumer journey, on-demand, personal, retail, social web, technology, trends
Posted by: Dan Shust 

 

I have to admit, I'm jazzed for the Olympics to start tonight, but not for the reasons you might think. While Michael Phelps bid for 8 gold medals is amazing and Dara Torres, competing in her 5th Olympic games at 41 years old, is inspirational, I'm more excited to see some digital records get broken.

Here are my podium picks:

Bronze Medal: McDonalds "The Lost Ring"

In March 50 bloggers received a mysterious package in the mail. It contained an Olympic poster and a ball of string that, when unraveled, revealed a web address. Thus began “The Lost Ring” an Alternate Reality Game (or ARG) that is currently being played in 7 languages across 100 countries. The players work together to hunt for clues to solve an ancient Olympic mystery. Immersive gameplay leads them to websites, blog posts, wikis, podcasts and even Twitter. 4 million people and counting have visited the launch site.

Silver Medal: Lenovo "Voices of the Olympic Games"

In an attempt to bring attention to a variety of less mainstream Olympic sports, Lenovo has given laptops and Flip video cameras to 100 athletes. (No other compensation is being provided.) Their only direction was to tell the rest of the world about their Olympic experience. Their blog posts are revealing, touching and sometimes humorous. Mainstream media will blast us with Phelps, LeBron, Kobe and Torres, but Lenovo's athlete bloggers allow us to partake in the "common" Olympian's experience.

Gold Medal: NBC - Digital Coverage

In 2006 NBC streamed one hockey game live form the Turin Winter Olympics. This year the network will stream over 2200 hours of live coverage and 3600 hours of on demand video will ultimately be available. Their custom video player is ground breaking, allowing the user to enjoy such features as closed captioning, expert commentary even for less popular events, integrated trivia, picture-in-picture and a "control room" view in which you can enjoy up to 4 live events simultaneously. NBC's coverage also includes a robust mobile web site, text messaging, e-mail alerts and mobile video.

So, there are my “Digital Olympics” medal winners. Each effort is game changing in its own way, but just imagine if they were all on the same team. When you do, you can almost see the future…

Tagged as: O.P.E.N., creative, digital millennials, engaging, iCitizen, mobile, networked, new consumer journey, on-demand, personal, retail, social web, technology, trends

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