Jet Setting for 2010

The eye in the sky, er, on the ground at a tarmac in the Seattle area this week apparently broke the news of Air Canada's aircraft decked out for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.

According to published reports, the photo and video sort of scooped a planned photo opp/unveiling. In the P.R. biz (or any biz, for that matter), one might call this a S.N.A.F.U. (a time or two similar scoops have foiled my own client P.R. efforts - D'OH!).

One time, in Denver, working at the U.S. Olympic Festival Opening Ceremony in Mile High Stadium (summer of 1995), the IOC deployed UPS couriers to deliver the official NOC invitations for Atlanta's Games, and in an elaborate media event/element of the Opening, a UPS plane -- clad with Olympic sponsorship logos -- buzzed the stadium several times (spectacular! so close you could almost see the pilot's logo hat). Then a few minutes later a brown-clad courier ran into the venue (after leaping from a brown package car, I believe) and handed the official IOC invitation to a waiting U.S. Olympic official. The whole thing was punctuated with a live performance by Kenny "I'm Alright" and "Footloose" Loggins. (Disclosure: UPS is a current client of Edelman, the P.R. firm where I work. I was neither employed by Edelman nor UPS at the time of the 1995 event described above.)

For Air Canada, my vote would be to proceed with planned photo opp or flyover in the Winter Olympic City as the plane looks pretty darn cool!

(photo via JetPhotos.net, copyright Mike Head, Jet Wash Photos)

USOTC Internship

Just stumbled upon the new U.S. Olympic Training Center summer intern blog. Looks like they are off to a great start with stories from the Olympic campus in Colorado Springs.

I, too, was a temporary USOTC resident via the intern class of '95 (summer). One fellow intern went on to achieve greatness at the American Junior Golf Association, and another is now married to a Major League Baseball player. Others are living the American Dream in California, New York (now an Emmy winner for Olympic coverage!) and even Vancouver. What a great summer it was, living just east of Pikes Peak!

Will be fun to recall the past intern glory days ("back in my day, we lived in some dated military barracks at the USOTC ...") while reading about the new Class of '09 adventures. Will also be interesting to see if the current class makes it to some of the past intern haunts (it appears some are the same while one of the most popular is now a car repair shop rather than a sports bar).

Maple Leaf Makeover

Received today from VANOC a press release regarding the new 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympic posters unveiled today with several Canadian Olympians in attendance.

According to the press release ...

“One of Canada’s most cherished symbols is the maple leaf. We put it on our flag, our uniforms and even our backpacks when we travel around the world. It sums up who we are — our shared history, values and goals as a country,” said Nathalie Lambert [three-time Olympic medallist in short track speed skating], Canada’s chef de mission for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games. “That’s why it’s fitting to have the maple leaf on the official posters of Canada’s Games. With this modern, youthful and spirited take on our national symbol, we will welcome the world as hosts of the 2010 Winter Games in just 228 days time!”

The website description for the posters states ...

"The Look of the Games graphic elements in the poster were created by members of the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games (VANOC) design team, while the concept of the poster and the unique interpretation of these graphics were brought to life by designer Ben Hulse."

The posters and other fabulous merchandise are available online starting today. Bravo!

(poster image copyright VANOC)

U.S.O.C. in NYTimes

Caught this quick read on the latest with the U.S. Olympic Committee by Katie Thomas of the New York Times posted yesterday.

Another interesting Olympic headline of late is this one from AFP related to the opening ceremony of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympic Games (The Canadian Press also ran a slightly more detailed report on this news).

With All This Talk About Motown ...

In the wake of Michael Jackson's death, the [usual for a celebrity of his calibre] cavalcade of tribute programming is flashing on the TV.

I've heard more about Motown and Detroit in the last 48 hours than perhaps the last year, save the near-daily news updates about the challenges faced by the U.S. auto industry.

With all this talk about Motown, and also thanks to a recent refresher course in online search techniques, this week I stumbled upon a handful of blogs mentioning a lengthy promotional video created in Detroit for the city's failed Olympic bid for the 1968 Summer Olympic Games.

I first heard about Detroit's Olympic aspirations while connecting on flights to and from Beijing last summer. Must admit, asked myself "for the summer Games, or winter?"

As pointed out by http://www.autoblog.com/ in their June 15 post, this summer Olympic bid film fails on several fronts. In addition to leaving out any mention of the Motown music industry, there are some surprising (albeit indicative of the era in which it was filmed) elements that were intended to showcase the city's diversity (unfortunately, shifted into an incorrect gear a time or two).

Another manner in which this film backfired: It is just plain boring!

C'mon! Even President Kennedy (around the 15 minute mark in the film) looks bored out of his mind reading a prepared statement to the voting members at the IOC Session. His gruff closing "thank you" is perhaps telling of where the bid fit in his list of priorities.

I expect members of the International Olympic Committee selection team for 1968 kept copies of this film on the ready in case of acute insomnia. The narration does not at all convey whatever "excitement" the city had for hosting the Games. Even newsreels of earlier times, whether true or fictional, had more pep. I'm anxious to find a copy of Mexico City's Olympic bid film for a comparison.

Fortunately, in spite of losing to Mexico's capital for the 1968 Olympic duties, some of Detroit's hometown auto brands did go on to sponsor the Olympic Movement in gigantic ways. I still remember spotting the auto industry Olympic ads during the 1980s.

During the summer of 1989, while volunteering for the U.S. Olympic Festival coming to Oklahoma City, I was part of a team of 100 or so drivers who created an Olympic photo opp involving 100 new cars from the General Motors plant in OKC (one of many P.R. moves learned in my pre-public relations career days). We parked 100 cars -- each clad with "OLYMPIC" Oklahoma license plates -- in the car plant's parking lot to arrange an "OK89" logo visible from local news helicopters.

GM also sponsored the Olympics (as do other import car brands) throughout the last several years, until they nixed global sponsorship (again, back to http://www.autoblog.com/).

Except by living vicariously through Michael Moore's great documentary films (new release on Oct. 2, the same day of the IOC vote for 2016), KISS songs (which reminds me, check out the REAL "Rock City," a former Edelman client of mine, here), Eminem's big screen debut (yo!), a popular Harrison Ford murder mystery film, and aforementioned Michael Jackson videos, I've only experienced Detroit via the city's modern airport -- there's no better spot for a pre-flight margarita than Detroit's vast international terminal (though the south of the border restaurant in LAX's Tom Bradley International Terminal gives DTW a run for it's money). I do hope to explore Detroit's architecture and cultural hubs -- some mentioned in the Olympic bid film -- and visit Detroit in the future.

Would like to think Detroit's non-selection as the first Great Lakes candidate will only contribute to Chicago's 2016 Olympic bid success. Fortunately, the Chicago 2016 Olympic bid videos feature a bit more excitement and drive (as does President Obama's pitch video for the bid)!

(photo cropped from image similar to one at http://olympianartifacts.com/ and via pages of "The Perlow Guide to Olympic Bid Pins")

Michael Jackson R.I.P.

Very sad to learn today of Michael Jackson's death. Given the enormity of his star power, it's surprising he did not perform at Olympic festivities during his career, though he did perform in several Olympic stadiums on various tours.

My earliest memory of Michael Jackson is actually from a cemetery, but not connected to the "Thriller" video. Rather, when I was six years old, on Christmas Eve of 1978, my grandmother, dad, sister and I went to the cemetery in northern Oklahoma City to place flowers at a family headstone, and one of The Jackson Five Christmas songs was on the radio in our red station wagon. We sang along, and my dad explained (I think) that the main singer was only a few years older than my age when the song was recorded. "That kid can sing [but not me]!" I recall saying [and thinking].

A few years later, the Michael Jackson/Paul McCartney duet "Say, Say Say" was all the rage, and I vividly recall donning my first Walkman in the 4th Grade with a "Thriller" cassette playing and an "Air Supply" and "Styx" cassette in my back pockets (though one of my top five favorites was on the air much earlier). I don't recall trying to learn the moonwalk, but classmates of that era may call me out if they are reading. Steve Martin offered up about the funniest "Billy Jean" spoof on the short-lived NBC enterprise "The New Show."

The closest the "Victory" tour got to Oklahoma was Kansas City or Dallas -- it was THE top story on all four local news stations (hundreds of miles from either tour stop), a definitive lesson of the publicity machine from a time before "publicity" entered my lexicon.

Lots of other memories -- songs, lyrics, satires, tabloids, music videos, tours, jokes, stories, other favorites (there are many) --learning of Michael Jackson's untimely end adds another curious mile marker to the "where were you when ..." collection including the "Miracle On Ice," Reagan assassination attempt, John Lennon's death, the Challenger explosion, Murrah Building, 9/11.

During college, there was a made for TV movie about the Jacksons, and we had a great debate about most loved (or loathed) Michael Jackson tunes. When he performed the Super Bowl a year or so later, most agreed his best work was humanitarian.

"There's a choice we're making, we're saving our own lives. It's true, we'll make a better day, just you and me."

Michael Jackson, R.I.P.

(images via http://www.mjsite.com/, http://www.askfactmaster.com/Michael_Jackson, http://www.jacksonmichael.info/)

100 Days from Olympic Day

Today was Olympic Day around the globe, and the morning started with a great NBC TODAY Show segment about the Chicago 2016 Olympic bid.

It was a low key holiday in Atlanta. I tried, but could not find details on the apparent local celebrations listed by Olympic Day organizers (until tonight, too late, I stumbled upon a listing on a website -- if I missed something big, read the following with a grain of salt).

To pause and commemorate things, this evening I took a walk through Centennial Olympic Park (which has a great virtual tour online) and asked a mix of locals and visitors if they knew what Olympic Day is or when it takes place -- to my surprise, one woman from Puerto Rico, who was posing for a photo with the park's monument to Modern Olympic Founder Baron Pierre de Coubertin, exclaimed "TODAY is Olympic Day, and my birthday, too!" (not surprising, no one else quizzed had any idea).

The walk provided a mixed bag of sentimentality and cynicism about the Olympic Movement and Atlanta's place in Olympic history.

On one hand, the Atlanta Olympic legacy including the vast urban park, other legacy venues and Turner Field (in view as I type this from high rise office downtown) are priceless. Almost every downtown Atlanta structure that borders Centennial Park -- except for The INFORUM, CNN Center and Tabernacle -- would not exist if the Games went to another city in 1996. And now that Centennial Olympic Park is in its adolescence, it is booming (remember when the trees were sticks in the ground? Now a gorgeous urban forest in bloom, and the fountains are all working again, post-drought!).

On the other hand, it seems sad that in spite of an army of employees and even larger army of volunteers rallied with the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG) from 1989 (bid days) to 1996, very few in Atlanta seem to celebrate or remember the Games on what is supposed to be its biggest day of celebration in a non-Olympic year.

They do come out of the woodwork every so often, getting out the pin collections and donning Olympic shirts from the glory days. There was a good (and large) celebration of ACOG's/Atlanta's 10th anniversary held in 2006, so that balances out some of what's negativity on the brain (the BBC's Kurt Barling filed an excellent report on the Atlanta Games legacy just after the 10th anniversary event -- be sure to watch the videos, too).

And then you look at the Los Angeles area's ambitious 25th anniversary gathering on the horizon and wonder "what will Atlanta remember/celebrate in 2021?"

Looking forward, it is cool to note that the 2016 host will be selected just 100 days from now. Here's hoping the 2009 Olympic Day celebrations across the U.S. only helped in that decision before the I.O.C. And perhaps, sometime in 2041, Chicago will celebrate its 25th Olympic anniversary.