Links tagged with “olympics”
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‘A massive betrayal’: how London’s Olympic legacy was sold out | Olympic legacy | The Guardian
I am shocked, shocked! that the Olympics wasn’t a great way to redevelop part of London. Who could possibly have guessed.
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Olympic Races, in Your Neighborhood - The New York Times
Very nicely-done (couldn’t be simpler) thing showing you how long and fast races are from your address. A bit like BERG’s old How Big Really.
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Jonathan Meades: Architects are the last people who should shape our cities | Art and design | The Guardian
In fine form. “It is the business of attempting to create places that defeats architects. Architects cannot devise analogues for what has developed over centuries, for generation upon generation of amendments. They cannot understand the appeal of untidiness and randomness, and even if they could they wouldn’t know how to replicate it.”
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Tait Technologies: Moving Images at Olympic Stadium
About the seat pixel things in the Olympic Stadium. Stunning, and they work so much better than I would have imagined. (via @knolleary)
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Iain Sinclair · Diary: My Olympics · LRB 30 August 2012
He’s usually an entertaining read, despite his relentless talking-down of even incidental things (I’m not sure Zara Phillips’ Olympic horse can be described as a “sore-hoofed nag”). But, more and more, I wonder, “What does Iain Sinclair *want*? I know what he’s against, but what is he *for*?”
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Not just shit but dangerous « Chris T-T
This is angry but, yes, unfortunately I agree with pretty much of all of it. We should look at the closing ceremony as epitomising what the opening ceremony, and the brilliant subsequent two weeks, were encouraging us to move away from. (via @blaine)
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Is any of us fit to pick up the Olympic baton? | Snowblog
“I am not alone in detecting a yearning to turn the extraordinary Olympic achievement into an engine for pulling together to deliver Olympic scale achievements with and for the wider Team GB, ourselves no less.” Easier said than done but, yes, this. (via @matlock)
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Warren Ellis » Closing
On the Olympic closing ceremony. Exactly right.
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London 2012: we’ve glimpsed another kind of Britain, so let’s fight for it | Jonathan Freedland | Comment is free | The Guardian
A nice piece on what the Olympics have shown us about what Britain can be. (via Stellar)
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Underworld’s brief to ‘frighten people’ at the London 2012 opening ceremony | Music | The Guardian
“The contrast between this summer’s two uber-spectaculars – the diamond jubilee concert and the Olympics opening ceremony – couldn’t be starker.” Yes, it felt like we’ve moved on from big events requiring 1980s musicians. (via Blech)
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London 2012: Danny Boyle’s story of Britain was a celebration of freedom | Shami Chakrabarti | Comment is free | The Guardian
“Humility”, “democratic”, “optimistic”. Words Shami Chakrabsti uses in association with Danny Boyle, which also help explain the appeal of the Ceremony itself. (via Alex Balfour)
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Collective Joy « LRB blog
Also on the opening ceremony: “It was love as sentiment, a nostalgic cry for what has been lost. And it is lost. There is no party of the left with a different attitude towards the economy, privatisation and cuts in benefits and the NHS.”
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Britain: this is for everyone - newsmary
On the Olympic opening ceremony: “The opening, pastoral and construction scenes showed clear class delineations; the joyous riot of music and popular culture that grew from it showed disparate, distinct but equal individuals. There’s a vision of utopia there, and it is neither homogenous nor segregated.” (via Blech)
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The night we saw our mad, fantastical dreams come true | Frank Cottrell Boyce | Comment is free | The Observer
On writing the wonderful opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics,
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The Daily Mail, And How An NHS Death Means… Racism Is Fine? - Botherer
The Daily Mail is the kind of dangerous thing that needs exposing, protesting against, fighting. Horrible. (via @D_Nye_Griffiths)
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Olympic Games opening ceremony: irreverent and idiosyncratic – a very British coup | Marina Hyde | Sport | The Guardian
“I’m still reeling that a country that can put on a show that hilariously bonkers is allowed nuclear weapons.”
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Olympic opening ceremony a Labour party broadcast? Yup, that’s about right | Sport | The Guardian
“This is it. This is Britain. Any idiot can industrialise. It takes a giant of a nation to make its healthcare provision free at point of need.” via @D_Nye_Griffiths
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London 2012: Beware billions bollocks. Ceremony to be huge TV hit, but not that huge « Sporting Intelligence
This is needed for every major TV event. And this doesn’t even take into account that NBC in the US isn’t showing the opening ceremony live.
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Olympics 2012: branding ‘police’ to protect sponsors’ exclusive rights | Sport | The Guardian
If you were wavering over your opinion of them, every paragraph here takes you closer to thinking “fuck the London Olympic Games 2012.”
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Olympics 2012 security: welcome to lockdown London | Stephen Graham | Sport | The Guardian
I did think that maybe, as the games approached, I would forget any earlier grumpiness over the vast sums of money spent on two weeks of sport but, ah, no. It is nuts.
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Summary of China Rights Developments | Human Rights Watch
Just in case you’re enjoying the Olympics so much you’ve forgotten all this stuff.
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LRB · Iain Sinclair: The Olympics Scam
Very good long article on the 2012 London Olympics and its effect on East London. I was getting won over by the Olympics until this reminded me how I really feel.
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Coudal Partners - The 2012 Olympic Logo: A Rant: London Broil
I hate the ‘London’ text, and I’m *slightly* nervous about it overall, but generally I agree with every point here. By 2012 the logo will be a familiar friend and few people will hate it. Certainly better than the usual naff Olympic logos. (via Haddock)
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BBC Sport | London beats Paris to 2012 Games
Bugger. If only there was some way one could opt out of paying for this nonsense, or put my money toward something actually useful.