Paris 2024: A Look at a Century of Olympics Sound and Picture When the Games debuted on broadcast in 1924, radio was in its tweens' By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Thursday, August 1, 2024 - 9:00 am
Print This Story
As broadcasters from all over the world cover the action in all 35 venues of the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics, it's a moment to look back at coverage of the Games a century ago, when broadcasting itself was still in its tween years.
In fact, it was from the Paris 1924 Olympics that radio first beamed the action, belated as it was. The telegraph was still being used to distribute results and scores. Radio Paris, founded the year before, essentially invented Olympics broadcast commentary with journalist Edmond Dehorter, and, every evening, the BBC summarized the day's events, according to the Olympics Museum.
Aside from the fact that bulky tube-powered broadcast equipment and equally cumbersome carbon microphones made remote production a kind of Manhattan Project, newspapers - the dominant media of the day - compelled the Beeb to broadcast bulletins only after 6 p.m. so as not to compete with their late editions. That mentality continued through the Los Angeles 1932 Summer Olympics, when papers dreaded being scooped by radio and the Games' organizers feared that live radio broadcasts would hurt ticket sales.
That concern was shared by MLB owners, who prohibited live radio during regular-season games, and by some Ivy League universities, including Harvard and Yale, which in 1932 decided that they would not allow any of their football games to be broadcast on radio that fall. (NBC and CBS, however, did manage to provide live coverage of the 1932 Winter Olympics.)
TV Coverage of the Games Television came into the picture - so to speak - for the Berlin 1936 Summer Olympics, when selected events were beamed live to athletes in the Olympic Village and to the wider public watching in 25 special public auditoriums and beer halls equipped with screens in Berlin, Potsdam, and Leipzig. On radio, the opening-day ceremonies in 1936 were heard in Los Angeles at 8 a.m. Pacific Time via NBC on both KFI and KECA; KHJ listeners heard the CBS-network feed from Germany.
For the Paris 1924 Olympic Games, results and scores were sent from the telegraph and telephone room at the Colombes Stadium (Photo: Getty Images/WSJ)
Television picked up the pace after the 1940 and 1946 Olympics were canceled because of World War II. In 1948, Olympic images from the London Games were transmitted directly into homes for the first time, live from Wembley Stadium and the Empire Pool.
Already, things were moving beyond the simple factual broadcast of the day's events, the Olympic Museum notes. Filming was live, angles and perspectives were multiplied, stories were told.
And they were film cameras. Actual video cameras, using the then-state-of-the-art Image Orthicon-tube camera developed by RCA, were deployed by broadcaster RAI for the first time at the 1956 Winter Games in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy. Four cameras were installed along the bobsled track, allowing television viewers to follow almost all the race as it unfolded.
Rome 1960 was the first Olympics to be broadcast live across Europe, using 40 black-and-white cameras, 11 mobile units, and 11 video recorders and providing slow motion for the first time. (It was also the first time that TV overtook radio as primary broadcast medium for Olympics coverage.) Coverage was delayed to the U.S., with video cassettes flown via commercial airliner to New York, where ABC's Jim McKay added commentary.
Tokyo 1964 was the first to reach a worldwide audience, via the first satellite broadcasts (over Syncom 3, the first geostationary communication satellite). Color television arrived four years later at the Mexico City 1968 Games, for which wireless, hand-held color cameras were deployed for the first time.
At the Munich 1972 Games, 25 competition venues were equipped with television cameras. The other 10 had cinema equipment, but all were used for television broadcasts using film-to-tape transfers. At the 1972 Winter Games in Sapporo, Japan, helmet-mounted minicams were introduced for the Alpine downhill-skiing competition, underscoring Japan's growing dominance in miniaturized electronics. That trend was inflective for the growing awareness that viewers wanted to get ever closer to the action.
(Summer and Winter Olympics were usually held in the same years until 1994, when they began to alternate two years apart. Though driven by advertising dollars, the change helped establish the Winter Olympics as a broadcast-sports entity. The 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway, were broadcast in more than 120 countries and, for the first time, to the African continent.)
Enter Olympic Broadcasting Services After that, the momentum of technological advance gained real steam. For the Seoul 1988 Summer Olympics, public broadcaster KBS built a state-of-the-art, nine-story complex, its nearly 700,000 sq. ft. housing four TV studios, 14 radio studios, and a 2,000-seat auditorium. For Barcelona 1992, CDD cameras, normally used in astronomy, made their appearance, as did digital video recorders.
Throughout the 20th century, national and regional broadcasters managed the Olympics broadcasts. In 2001, that changed: the International Olympic Committee established its own filming and broadcasting service, Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS), making coverage of the Games no longer dependent solely on the host country. That, in turn, accelerated the pace of technology deployed for the Games.
The Beijing 2008 Games were the first to be produced and broadcast entirely in HDTV. London 2012 experimented with multichannel audio and 8K cameras, and live broadcasting in 3D was tested for the first time. The Opening and Closing Ceremonies and the m
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
27/11/2025
LONDON Vizrt has added several AI-driven advanced features offering improved speed, intelligence and accuracy in the newest version of its media asset managemen...
27/11/2025
Prime Video has launched AI-powered video season recaps in a beta version for select English-language Prime Original series in the U.S., a move Amazon is callin...
27/11/2025
27 Nov 2025
GSMA brings M360 Eurasia 2026 to Samarkand in partnership with VEON...
27/11/2025
Tahar Rahim and Izuka Hoyle star in the gripping six-part Sky Original from Acad...
27/11/2025
Thursday 27 November 2025
Sky Arts Reveals the Nation's Greatest Basslines - and Queen Reign Supreme
The UK's most iconic basslines have been revealed...
27/11/2025
Back to All News
Stranger Things 5': Prepare for One Last Adventure With O...
27/11/2025
The media industry has a paradox at its core. It's an industry built on light, color and imagination, yet behind the scenes, it's powered by one of the ...
27/11/2025
Rating reflects rating progress across areas including policies, diversity & inclusion, health & safety and Net Zero leadership
Winchester, UK, 27 November 202...
27/11/2025
What are the industry standards for Retail Media? Kathryn explains that certification is based on the IAB Europe Retail Media Measurement Standards and the IAB ...
27/11/2025
World champion boxer and Irish sporting icon Katie Taylor will be in studio this...
27/11/2025
Roblox, one of the world's most popular online gaming platforms for primary ...
27/11/2025
Black Friday is leveling up. Get ready to score one of the biggest deals of the season - 50% off the first three months of a new GeForce NOW Ultimate membership...
26/11/2025
SVG Sit-Down: Prime Video EP Mike Muriano Previews Massive Black Friday Slate Fe...
26/11/2025
A cinematic snow sculpture at the 1995 Sundance Film Festival. Photo by Randall Michelson...
26/11/2025
Book podcasts are booming. On Spotify, you'll find everything from celebrity book clubs to deep dives with bestselling authors. And in markets where audiobo...
26/11/2025
Mumbai, November 24, 2025: In a first-of-its-kind initiative, JioStar, in collab...
26/11/2025
LONDON Factual content producer ITN Productions has launched a new low-latency IP gallery for news bulletins....
26/11/2025
MIAMI TelevisaUnivision said it struck a new multiyear distribution agreement with YouTube TV that includes distribution of TelevisaUnivision's U.S. network...
26/11/2025
OpenDrives, Inc., a leader in software-defined data storage and data services, today announced the launch of the Atlas Corporate Creative Solution. This new Atl...
26/11/2025
Disguise, the industry-leading company powering the world's biggest live performances, is partnering with pioneering LED wall manufacturer DVS to give atten...
26/11/2025
HighField AI, the pioneer in agentic and multimodal automation for broadcast and media production, today announced the expansion of its global channel partner n...
26/11/2025
As high-stakes Premier League fixtures approach and additional premium content launches, with MONO positioning themselves to dominate Thailand's sports stre...
26/11/2025
Hosting a wide variety of events from high-intensity NHL games to complex live music concerts and major entertainment productions, Montreal's 21,000 capacit...
26/11/2025
Vizrt, the leader in live production technology revolutionizing viewer engagement and experience, releases AI-driven advances focusing on speed, intelligence, a...
26/11/2025
ITN Productions, an award-winning factual content producer, today launched a new low-latency IP gallery for news bulletins. Responsible for delivering a leading...
26/11/2025
Ikegami reports ongoing advances throughout 2025 in developing and delivering coordinated television production solutions that maximize quality, versatility and...
26/11/2025
Following the Nov. 21 blackout of NBCUniversal channels on Fubo, the two sides have traded barbs about their inability to reach a new carriage deal....
26/11/2025
LONDON As TV sports rights become increasingly important for both broadcasters and streamers, Ampere Analysis predicts global investment in the genre will surpa...
26/11/2025
LOS ANGELES Vubiquity said it has achieved the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Media & Entertainment Competency as part of the AWS Partner Network (APN). This designa...
26/11/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission's Enforcement Bureau said it has entered into a consent decree with Comcast calling for the cable company t...
26/11/2025
Berklee Named to the Hollywood Reporters Top Music Schools List The publication highlights the college's screen scoring program, industry partnerships, and ...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
Animated Series Love Through a Prism' Casts New Light on ...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
NALIP Unveils Fifth Cohort of Director Incubator
Social Impact
26 November 2025
United States
Link copied to clipboard
The National Assoc...
26/11/2025
YouView Achieves Greenly Gold Certification for SustainabilityNov 26, 2025
YouView is proud to announce a Gold Certification award from Greenly for our perform...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
Netflix Deepens Partnership with Taiwan's 62nd Golden Hors...
25/11/2025
Tracy Bonareri Onchoke, an investigative journalist from Kenya is the winner of the Thomson Foundation's Young Journalist Award 2025.
The 26-year-old-sele...
25/11/2025
SVG All-Stars: Blayke Scheer, Senior Director, Creative Content, YES NetworkThe Indiana alum has turned storytelling into an artform for more than two decadesBy...
25/11/2025
Op-Ed: With FCC's C-Band Auction on the Horizon, Broadcasters Need Proven, C...
25/11/2025
Analysis: Is Baller League really the future of sport? By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Tuesday, November 25, 2025 - 10:10
Print This Story
With KSI on...
25/11/2025
Platinum Whitepaper: The Growth of Broadcast in the World of Major Large Scale E...
25/11/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: SVG Women's Sports WorkshopBy Samantha Gabay
Tuesday, November 25, 2025 - 10:27 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlig...
25/11/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: CacheFly's Matt Levine on the Evolving Role of th...
25/11/2025
Peacock's EA SPORTS Madden NFL Cast Levels Up on Thanksgiving With SkyCam as...
25/11/2025
Mathias Broe attends the 2025 Sundance Film Festival premiere of Sauna at Library Center Theatre. (Photo by Michael Hurcomb/Shutterstock for Sundance Film Fes...
25/11/2025
The best playlists, podcasts, and audiobooks bring a little extra magic to your daily routine. With new features and offerings, Spotify Premium delivers even mo...
25/11/2025
Comprehensive new research confirms what we already knew: Australian music fans love the quality, quantity, and access they have to new and local music on strea...
25/11/2025
Applicable Products
Objectives The purpose of this application note is to give a brief background on 5G (NR) wireless communication an explain the reason a SN...
25/11/2025
Nielsen will now measure both Lionsgate's FAST channel MovieSphere and Movie...
Paris 2024: A Look at a Century of Olympics Sound and Picture When the Games debuted on broadcast in 1924, radio was in its tweens' By Dan Daley, Audio Editor 
