"The BBC is going to have a bigger team at the 2012 Olympics than Team GB", according to similar reports in The Independent, The Guardian and The Sun.
The Guardian's article tells us:
The BBC is to employ a staff of 765 people to cover the London 2012 Olympic Games, a larger team than the 550 athletes who will represent Team GB.
Clearly we're meant to think this comparison is somehow shocking, though having never been a major broadcaster at a London Olympics the numbers are all a little wasted on me.
What we're not meant to think of course is "what does the size of Team GB have to do with how many people the BBC needs to broadcast the Olympics?"
The comparison is entirely arbitrary.
It is clearly intended to sound logical, at least long enough for us to get all outraged, as if the number of people running, jumping and throwing things at the Olympics should somehow bear some relation to the number of people it takes to put together round the clock multimedia broadcast, text and web coverage of the Olympics.
The articles are based on a blog post by Roger Mosey, Director of London 2012 at the BBC, which lifts the lid on what a mammoth operation the BBC's coverage will require. Responding to the inevitable criticism and inexplicable comparison, Mosey tweeted:
It's a fair point.
Well indeed. One can assume the BBC had more staff covering the PM's trip to Burma than there were British Prime Ministers visiting Burma, for instance.
Posted by: Tom Bowker | Apr 27, 2012 at 10:30
To be fair though, the Grauniad does point out (near the end of the short article) that US network NBC will have 1200 plus staff at the games.
Posted by: Paul Rowley | Apr 27, 2012 at 11:47