Coverage of the Olympic Games is dominated by the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) contracted rights-holder and accredited major media conglomerates. However some feel there is a role for crowdsourced documentation of both sporting events and the cultural context in which it happens.

This expert panel discusses changes, challenges, and opportunities facing grassroots media makers around the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games.

From Northern Voice 2009.

Robert Scales from Raincity Studios and Kris Krug from Bryght are featured in today’s Vancouver Sun article, “Canadians Trying To Land Beijing Contracts”. Vancouver Sun reporter Wency Leung came into our offices a few days ago to interview Robert and Kris and spoke with them about their upcoming trip to China, getting a scope and understanding on how Raincity and Bryght is looking to effect and learn from the tech and new media industry in Beijing, in conjunction with preparing for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.

Vancouver Sun Article Excerpt:

Vancouver-based new media partners Bryght and Raincity Studios, which are working with China Access 2008, also see opportunities at the Beijing Olympics for B.C.’s technology companies.
“We think there’s a huge market opportunity for us to do work with Chinese Internet service providers, and Chinese hosts and Chinese web development shops,” said Kris Krug of Bryght.
He added that a presence at the Beijing Games will also help Bryght and Raincity Studios prepare for the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver and Whistler.
“We have an interest in learning as much as we can [at the Beijing Games] so that we can find out what companies and teams and countries are looking to do online around the 2010 Olympics,” Krug said.

Kris and Rob head over to China on Thursday for 2 weeks, getting on the ground and exploring first-hand the opportunities that potentially lie ahead.

Tomorrow they will be attending the China Access Forum, meeting people from other local BC companies who have already successfully initiated business in China.

You can register for the event on the China Access website and mark it on your upcoming.org account as well.

Listen Live to a reading of the article.

Wency Leung will be tracking Rob and Kris in China and will be following up with their progress upon their return.

Kris Krug from Bryght is spearheading an initiative to have a delegations of companies, including Raincity Studios travel to Torino, Italy for the Olympics next month.

Yesterday, Kris and I met with members of New Media BC to explore ways to join our efforts.

At first glance, it looks like we will be there between the 14th to the 26th of February. During the first few days, we will be hosting a few media events and information sessions on “Web 2.0 and the Olympics” at the BC Canada House, next to the Media Centre. We plan on doing some Olympic blogging, podcasts and vcasts on location and attend a few events.

Here’s a little clip from Boris Mann of Bryght, speaking about Mobile Media and the olympics, posted on Now Public

You can expect us to blog more about this over the next few weeks as our planning effort translate into a more concrete plan of action.

For more information or if you would like to join the delegation, please contact me (robert at raincitystudios dot com) or Kris (kris at bryght dot com)