(ATR) Viewers can catch every moment of the PyeongChang Games on NBC live across all U.S. time zones.
This will be the first time this has been done since the Games were first broadcast on television in the late 1960's.
The transition could potentially increase viewership of the upcoming games along with promote growing interest, sports marketing consultant and professor at Columbia University Joe Favorito tells Around the Rings.
"It is obvious that the world has changed how we engage, and the goal with NBC admitting this and trying to acknowledge how to deal with it, is to give people live events wherever they are on whatever device their on," says Favorito.
"It shows you NBC reacting and being proactive in the marketplace to make sure they are delivering the product that people want, whenever they want it, on whatever device it is, live."
NBC Olympics production and programming president Jim Bell said in a statement that viewers around the world will be able to share in what he calls a "communal experience" receiving information at the same time through both television and streaming online.
He goes on to additionally point out that social media "being ahead of the Olympic action" will no longer be an issue.
"People use, especially a platform like Twitter, as a barometer for what people should engage in. So, people will see something immediately on Twitter and go to whatever device they're using to watch the live event," Favorito says.
"So as they are progressing, they [television and social media] both have to play hand in hand. You have to be able to go wherever people are and engage with them there."
During the 2016 Games in Rio, NBC's coverage averaged 25.4 million viewers - a drop of 18 percent from London 2012 mostly attributed to the growth in streaming and taped delayed broadcasts in Pacific and Mountain time zones.
Yale School of Management Lecturer of Sports Marketing Grant Son also tells ATR he believes this new approach will help NBC to stay ahead of the game.
"The real power of sports viewing versus traditional TV viewing is that sports is best consumed live. And, live sports programming is a key catalyst of social media sharing. NBC has to pivot their approach to broadcasting the Olympic games to keep up," says Son.
"Giving avid sports fans access to more live Olympic programming will create incremental broadcast TV viewership and help address the overall decline."
On most nights of the Games, the primetime broadcast will begin at 8 p.m. Eastern, 7 p.m. Central, 6 p.m. Mountain, and 5 p.m. Pacific, according to NBC. The prime time segment will be followed by local news in all time zones before a return to live coverage with Primetime Plus. After that, a replay of the primetime program will be aired.
The PyeongChang Games will take place from Feb. 9 until Feb 25. The Paralympics will be held March 9-18.
Homepage photo: PyeongChang 2018
Written by Courtney Colquitt
Forgeneral comments or questions, click here.
25 Years at #1: Your best source of news about theOlympics is AroundTheRings.com, for subscribersonly.