INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC ACADEMY 7th JOINT - IOA

and light all have a great importance. The role of the visual media is to
get the right amount of cameras, get to know where the best places for
filming are, both for close up filming, slow motion and concerning
where and how to sort out what clips of the filming match the timing
of the play. (Dyhr, 2004)
So, what is the positive effect of the visual media on the Olympic
Games and in particularly on the Olympic athlete? One aspect of
television is the money received by the organizers of the competitions.
The TV media have also created the athletes recognition by the public,
which has in turn generated sponsorship not only for the athletes but
also clubs and National Olympic Committees (Schmitt, 2003).
Through sponsorship and endorsement, more and more athletes have
turned professional.
The other aspect is that television has brought dramatic reforms to
the universality of sport. One of the reasons sport is so popular in the
TV all over the world could be because sport appears as a common
language in itself that everybody is able to understand. In other words,
the barriers that normally exist across frontiers such as language
barriers and cultural differences do not seem to be considered as a
problem (http://www.kum.dk).
The media’s power and their influence on the organisation of the
visual setting seem also to have a negative effect on the Games and
the future of the high performance sport as well. Instead of
maintaining the Games as an event that takes place to show the
diversity of the sport by involving less known sports as well, the IOC
has been trying to popularise the Games. In the attempt to fulfil this
goal, the organisation has tried to attract many popular professional
sport stars that perform within popular types of sport such as
basketball, tennis, football and golf. The IOC has also changed the
rules in the less known sports:
� Today the players in table tennis play a set to 11 points and
moreover the game has also introduced a bigger ball to make
the game slower for the eye.
� The fencers have tried with plastic mask instead of grated
mask, which makes it possible for the audience to see the one
who suffer in his/her face during the game.
� In Beach volley women have to wear a bikini in accordance
with the new rules. (Larsen, 2004)
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