• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, June 10, 2011

Every Olympic event in the future will be seen live -- even if it starts at 2:30 a.m. on your local TV station, even if it's only on your tablet device. It is more of a transparent TV world, after all.

The New York Times interviewed former Olympics TV producer Mike Weisman , who said, "Live comes across as more honest, with blemishes and mistakes." Yep. That's what we want to see -- the danger and possiblility of big mess-ups.

NBC Universal's winning bid for the Olympics from 2014 to 2020 includes a provision that it will air all events live -- even if not through traditional TV distribution. This makes sense in a 24/7 world filled with growing video platform and device options.

The cost? Probably pretty high. But there is no excuse to pretend. In the past, NBC's Olympics had a "presumed live" philosophy. That's fake. And it doesn't work in this reality-minded TV world. In their bids, Fox and ESPN also promised to air all Olympic events live.

NBC lost more than $200 million on the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and could lose about the same for the 2012 London Summer games . But now, NBC's coverage will have a more honest feel -- especially in telling viewers what is live and what isn't.

For sophisticated viewers, the issue has been increasingly about transparency. This isn't to say that networks shouldn't rerun live events in primetime. They just have to be frank and say they happened some time in the past.

This shouldn't just apply to sports: "30 Rock" did a live episode this past season; "ER" had earlier done the same. Reality shows such as "American Idol" and "Dancing with the Stars" already regularly offer many live episodes.

All live events can have occasional rough camera work, and include some unsettling remarks. The good news is that viewers aren't interested in perfection. They want to see the process in real-time, warts and all -- even at 3 a.m. in the morning.