NBC Posts $223 Million Loss on Winter Olympics (Dinosaur Media DeathWatch™)

CBS News ^ | April 16, 2010

[Zakeet]

The tally is in: NBC lost $223 million on the Winter Olympics in the first quarter.

That's slightly better than the most recent estimate of $250 million in losses. Advertising sales have improved a bit since NBC parent General Electric Co. made that projection in late January.

The Olympics did bring about $800 million in extra revenue to GE. But NBC had a lot of production and other expenses, including $820 million just to acquire the rights to carry the Vancouver Games on television and online. That expense was cited as the main culprit for the red ink.

[1rudeboy]

It’s not a non-sequitur: if you want to pay more for lightbulbs because you feel GE doesn’t pay it’s fair share of taxes, you should come right out and say it. And it’s profit was $10 billion, by the way . . . nothing’s change since you posted on that GE thread yesterday.

[HapaxLegamenon]

I wonder how much they lost on Chris Matthews and Keith Olberdorkk.

[MsLady]

I think I heard O’Rielly say the other day that Comcast was going to be buying NBC. Maybe, just maybe that’ll change things. Otherwise this bird is dead and obama will have to resurrect it with out tax dollars. Gotta get your propaganda somewhere, dont’cha know.

[philman_36]

One step closer to the grave.

[stephenjohnbanker]

“if you want to pay more for lightbulbs “

No no you don’t. YOU said I wanted to pay more, NOT me.

And my post was humor, not serious. Never saw “Evita” ?.

By the way, it is easy to hide profits overseas under the guise of “loan payable” or “retained earnings” The laws are far different, depending on what country you are operating in. Think they only made 10 billion? LOL!

[1rudeboy]

If x is the amount of income taxes that GE paid in 2009, and x = 0, then you want GE to pay x + 1 in income taxes.

My question to you is, how much of x + 1 are you willing to pony-up? Because the money that GE collects in income comes from you, not a printing press in the basement of GE headquarters.

[Thermalseeker]

“Fat bottom girls you make the rockin’ world go round......”

[InvisibleChurch]

I enjoyed curling for awhile until NBC got caught up in it and it was all they showed on cnbc.

[stephenjohnbanker]

“My question to you is, how much of x + 1 are you willing to pony-up? Because the money that GE collects in income comes from you, not a printing press in the basement of GE headquarters.”

There! That is the question you should have started with. My answer is I don’t care if they pay any income tax or not, as long as they abide by the accepted accounting rules.

On a personal note...Immelt is an incompetent, who has made his bed with Obama. So as long as this “Welsh wannabe” jerkoff is in power, I don’t give a rats behind how GE does.

[ErnBatavia]

I could curl up with that....

[Red in Blue PA]

I smell a Bailout coming!

[junta]

ditto

[Red in Blue PA]

Cheryl Bernard from Canada is probably the hottest curler ont he planet.

[Varda]

NBC is terrible with the Olympics. I loath their “up close and personal” stories. I've read they do this because they think this is what female viewers want. I used to watch the Olympics from opening ceremonies to closing but no more. I want to cheer for Americans, not “citizen of the world” types.

I especially wanted to see men's ice hockey (not homosexual figure skating) which was relegated to the sub-channels. Fortunately our cable company added those in HD right before the games. Even though ice hockey was one of the most anticipated events, they showed men's and women's CURLING in it's entirety even when it's time overlapped the hockey. I can't understand the depth of stupidity that went into that decision.

[US_MilitaryRules]

Just another bright light in this gloomy economy! BWAAAHAAAHAAA!!!!!!!!!

[TomGuy]

because they think this is what female viewers want

That is why NBC had so much ice dancing, while hockey was pushed to MSNBC and CNBC.

That is, until the viewership of the hockey games was so much higher than NBC's ice dancing. Then, they pulled the hockey finals back to NBC.

[One would think that, after years of losing money on women's basketball, NBC would have learned a valuable lesson.]

[ConservativeMind]

You are both forgetting the huge help GE got for its bad investments from the government this past two years.

Wasn’t it GE that owned one little bank somewhere and used that to qualify ALL if its bad debts for the bailout?

Screw GE and any other entity that got those dollars from the government. There was no reason a single dollar was handed out to any company.

If you made a bad investment, you should have to live by it—not make the taxpayer foot your bill.

[1rudeboy]

Now that's an interesting thought: take our money (already taxed once or twice), and give it to GE and complain that it doesn't get taxed once again.

[ConservativeMind]

You don’t understand. I don’t have a problem with companies not paying taxes.

I have a problem with companies getting free government dollars to cover for the companies’ bad decisions—especially when they connive to have their whole corporation under the umbrella of a small town bank for that bailout.

[1rudeboy]

I don’t even know if GE received cash, if you do, please share. I know that GE Capital received some loan guarantees, but it’s not the same thing.