ercles on 16/2/2010 at 08:24
Quote Posted by Swiss Mercenary
Can't fund the event through ticket sales? Then the form you want to run it in is clearly unsustainable.
You genuinely think that the only properly managed sports events should break even on the basis of ticket sales?
EDIT: Mallison, surely you realise that the infrastructure created for the Olympics can be used for a tonne of subsequent events, which can continue to raise revenue. Although I can't see anyone running a competition at Cyprus anytime soon, FIS and other winter bodies are generally keen to try and host winter events in North America, both to broaden horizons, and because the snow conditions are (ironically) generally more reliable over here, especially for early season events.
Swiss Mercenary on 16/2/2010 at 08:35
You're asking a loaded question.
Frankly, I don't care how the committee raises their money. Ticket sales. Broadcasting rights.
I don't care.
What I do care about, is the public paying for their share of the pie... And then seeing that pie divided by all sorts of private companies. Hell, if things go well, we'll get a few crumbs.
Use the infrastructure for future events? Even if we needed this infrastructure, we shouldn't be using the Olympics as an excuse for building it.
And we sure as hell don't need it. There is a myriad ways that money could be put to far better use in this province.
heywood on 16/2/2010 at 15:19
Quote Posted by Swiss Mercenary
Then the form you want to run it in is clearly unsustainable.
It is sustainable as long as cities are willing to build the facilities/infrastructure for it. If/when that is no longer the case, the IOC will probably have to start revisiting cities that previously hosted the games and already have most of the facilities in place.
Keeper Mallinson on 16/2/2010 at 17:30
Ercles, we already have an enormous amount of venues for winter sports. I have three mountains to choose from, all with giant sports centres. All my life, at night, when Grouse Mountain is indistinguishable from the dark sky, the lights from the slaloms there look like a giant floating fortress in the sky. When I was four I thought that's what it was, funny story. Other than that, every important thing built "for" the Olympics (housing, skytrains, etc.) were being built anyway (or at least promised to us for years and years), and people are giving the Olympics credit for their creation. If these things were built without the fiscal fumbles brought on by the fake optimism that came with the Olympic upgrades, we could have prepared more, and it likely would have been cheaper without all these bells and whistles. As for the rest of it, the stuff we don't need, like that giant centre next to the giant centre that already existed, with the golf-course roof and everything plowed down to make it? that money came from programs that had real effects on the poor, and funding for the arts. I can't begin to describe the effect here.... many, many people have lost their jobs because entire sectors were abandoned, and I wish I knew how the homeless were doing. My fiancee's organisation used to be able to help those of them with developmental disabilities, until it was decided that the organisation didn't need the money as much as the olympic committee, and that it's immoral to help the drug-addicted through indirect means.
Turtle on 16/2/2010 at 23:22
Quote Posted by Swiss Mercenary
Good. And cities without that infrastructure in place, that bid on the games are governed by either morons or patriots. If someone's going to lose money on the games, it better not be me.
Sounds like you need to be ranting about your government, not "The Olympics".
Swiss Mercenary on 16/2/2010 at 23:32
Quote Posted by Turtle
Sounds like you need to be ranting about your government, not "The Olympics".
Or, more specifically, the Olympics in Vancouver.
When they go to London, I won't be pissing in their cornflakes.
PeeperStorm on 17/2/2010 at 03:14
Hate to break it to you, but I don't think that you're having any effect on their cornflakes whatsoever.
Matthew on 17/2/2010 at 10:55
I quite liked your opening ceremony.
june gloom on 17/2/2010 at 12:44
Stay classy TTLG.
quinch on 18/2/2010 at 10:33
How about that tomahawk double McTwist 1260 thing? :eek:
