The computer system that stumbled at the 1996 Olympics
Info '96 was supposed to supply journalists with instant results. It didn't.
For the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, a high-tech computer system was supposed to supply journalists with up-to-the-minute results while reporting on the Games.
Problem was, it didn't quite work.
"Info '96 it's called. And it has three corporate giants behind it," said reporter Keith Boag.
Created by IBM, Xerox, and Swatch, the system promised to give split-second event results as well as schedules and team information.
But it didn't deliver on that promise.
'No information'
"Lack of information, wrong information, no information, and too-late information," said a journalist at the media centre where kiosks had been set up.
Officials said they were working on it, but Boag cited examples of system failure like results that didn't show up hours later and nonexistent matches.
"We may have been a little too ambitious," allowed Dick Pound, the Canadian vice president of the International Olympic Committee.
Sifting through piles of paper to get hard copies turned out to be more useful for media, said Boag.
And "a few European broadcasters" were ready to demand a refund for the expensive touch-screen system they'd paid for if it wasn't working soon.
And then there were more mundane irritations for media: buses that broke down, and accredited camera operators who were blocked from venues.
"The country that likes to think of itself as leading the world into the next century, still hasn't figured out the way some things work in this one," summed up Boag.
