New York - NBC Universal (NYSE: GE) this week granted both Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and AT&T (NYSE: T) rights to air its Olympics coverage on the broadband, IPTV and mobile platforms. Live event streaming, NBC Olympics video-on-demand and daily highlight clips will be offered on AT&T's U-Verse and Verizon's FiOS TV digital TV services, while on-demand content and interactive widgets will be available to the companies' broadband subscribers. NBC's Olympics 2Go mobile TV channel will be available to both AT&T Mobile TV and Verizon V CAST mobile TV service subscribers; both services are powered by Qualcomm's MediaFLO USA.

Shanghai, China - PPLive, a provider of peer-to-peer-based Internet TV broadcasting and online video streaming in China that claims over 100 million users worldwide, said on Monday that it has signed a deal with China Central Television's CCTV.com, to provide live online broadcasts of Olympic sporting events, as well as the opening and closing ceremonies.

New York - NBC Universal (NYSE: GE) announced on Wednesday that it will offer 3,600 hours of Olympics coverage across its flagship NBC and six cable networks, including nearly 2,900 hours of live coverage, and 2,200 hours of streaming Web video. The company said its coverage of the event nearly triples the total hours offered from Athens in 2004. "With 25 sports streamed live at NBCOlympics.com and significant live coverage on our cable platforms and NBC, highlighted by all swimming finals, the biggest nights of gymnastics and beach volleyball live in primetime, the viewer has plenty of options for live coverage," said Dick Ebersol, chairman of NBC Universal Sports & Olympics. A PDF file of the network's coverage itinerary is available from a link below.

San Antonio, Texas - AT&T (NYSE: T) announced on Monday that a number of top-selling artists will record exclusive tracks for a "Team USA" soundtrack for the U.S. Olympic Team, with proceeds from music downloads and ringtone sales to benefit the team. NBC will also feature excerpts from the songs and music videos from the album in its Olympic Games coverage. Contributing artists on the project include 3 Doors Down, Army of Me, Colbie Caillat, Sheryl Crow and Nelly.

It's hardly an original insight to note that traditional media companies are trapped in their legacy business models at a time of rapid change in technology and consumer behavior. But rarely do you see the old and the new in such stark tension as in the case of NBC Universal's plans for presenting the upcoming Summer Olympics in Beijing. According to this AP story, NBC will offer an unprecedented 1,400 hours of TV coverage across its six networks--more than all previous Summer Olympics combined--as well as 2,200 hours of live coverage on the Web and over 3,000 hours of highlights available on-demand from NBCOlympics.com.

New York - NBC on Monday announced that it will offer free downloads of its Olympics coverage on laptop computers running Microsoft Windows Vista Media Center. Powered by Wavexpress' TVTonic, the NBC Olympics on the Go service will automatically download selected events on a sport-by-sport basis, "so viewers will have a fresh slate of Olympic content to watch on their morning commute."

New York - The Associated Press announced on Tuesday that it has signed a deal with NBC Sports and NBC Olympics, to provide NBC-produced text content and video links related to the 2008 Olympic Games through a premium online service. News publishers that subscribe to the premium AP service will receive the news agency's own Olympics coverage along with links to footage from NBC, which owns the exclusive broadcast rights to the Olympics.

Beijing - China's CDC Games, a publisher of online multiplayer games, on Tuesday announced it has invested an undisclosed sum in Xiakexing Network Technologies (XNet), a developer of online games and game technologies.

Shanghai - Baidu, the leading search engine in China, has won a license from the Chinese government to provide original news reports on its website, Reuters reported, citing government and industry sources.