The Great Gordino Newsletter – May 12th 2014

Hi,
I hope all is well with you.

I read with interest this week about the possibility of the 2016 Olympics being switched to come back to London!

I say I read with interest, because there’s no way it could happen, but was fascinated to read more. It seems a leaked ‘report’ said that Rio is so far behind in preparations that the IOC is now in emergency mode.

At this stage in the cycle, Athens was at 40% ready, London was at 60%, and Rio is only at 10% ready.

The problem with coming back to London is that the Olympics take years of planning, and a lot of money! Part of the plan has to include what will happen after the Games, and that includes the venues, the transport infrastructure, athletes village, etc.

That phase of London is already 2 years further down the line, so to turn it back as if time stood still is not realistic. I suspect it was the IOC playing politics to shame Rio into action – they deny all aspects of the story.

It was the Eurovision Song Contest in Denmark this week. Ah Eurovision. it’s something I’ve grown up watching, and yes, I can remember ABBA winning 40 years ago.

It gets slagged off quite badly here in the UK, mostly by people who don’t even watch it but feel the peer pressure need to dismiss it, or by people who do watch it but feel they will be criticised if they say they like it!

I *love* it! It’s one of the dates in the year that I will schedule things around so I can watch and enjoy it. Each to their own and all that, I know that for some people it’s simply not to their taste, and that’s fine, but a live event watched by nearly 200 million people always gets me going.

"Eurovision", "Gordon Bryan"

click to go to eurovision.tv on youtube

My favourite was the Netherlands entry – a simple country song. It got the maximum 12 points from 8 countries and a total of 238 points, which would win most years, but what they didn’t have compared to the winner, was publicity. A drag act with a beard from Austria won, and was in the media all week. That kind of publicity is worth a huge number of votes – take that away and the Netherlands would have won.

The key thing is though, the publicity for the Austrian act *was* there. The Netherlands had done everything right, but were just pipped by something outside their control. They could have stripped naked and sworn into the camera – that would have given them publicity, but taken away from the simple style they were going for.

I liked it though, it’s the song I’ll remember from this year.

So I’ve covered a sporting story and a music/entertainment story, which long time readers will know are 2 big passions for me, and they are the kind of passions I’ll be covering in my new product, which is about turning passions into profits online.

I’m excited about it, and in line with my latest coach, I am currently in the process of putting together a free introductory guide to how anyone can follow the steps and end up with profits from their passions, which could well be enough to allow people to follow their passions without money restrictions. Watch this space!

Ok, that’s it for this week, do let me know your thoughts – what do you think of Eurovision, would a hastily rerun London Olympics work, and what are your biggest passions?

‘Til Next Time,
Health & happiness,
Gordon
P.S. Don’t forget, if you haven’t already, you can use the social media buttons at the top right of the page to connect with me on your favourite channel to keep updated

Do leave a comment!

Leave a Reply to Sophie Bowns X

12 Comments

  • I wrote about the Olympics returning to London last week, and think it was a way to shame Rio. I suppose Rio has taken a lot on with hosting the World Cup too.

    As for Eurovision, I love it too. It crept up on us this year, but my husband was so excited when he got home from work to find out it was on. I’ve stayed away from most of the hype this year, but do remember some of the publicity surrounding Conchita Wurst. I liked her song though (loved the James Bond theme-style). I wasn’t overly impressed with The Netherlands, but I think that was something about the female singer–her eyebrows constantly moving put me off…Norway’s was my favourite this year with Sweden close behind.

    • A rerun London Olympics would end up as just that, a rerun – Rip must have real problems for the IOC to do that with still 2 years to go!

      I liked Sweden too, and yes the girl from Netherlands did have twitchy eyebrows! She could twitch them at me any day of the week though! Most intense singing was Spain, she was belting that song out!
      I do get frustrated with people posting how rubbish it was, how bad *all* the songs were, when I ask them if they watched it, they say ‘well, no I didn’t’!!

      • I forgot about Spain’s, but I did like that while watching it. Hungary was another one I surprisingly enjoyed. My daughter was dancing along to the Belarus one, but I let her off since she’s not even 2 yet, and just likes to boogie.

        A friend used to laugh at me for watching Eurovision and enjoying the music, but she’d never watched it. She was surprised when she heard one of the Eurovision songs on my iPod and thought it was a mainstream band. That soon shut her up the next time Eurovision was on! There are some very cheesy acts, but a lot of great music has been on it over the last few years.

        • yes, could not have put it better myself – there’s some real dross in there, but gems along the way, and when the critics hear the gems, they huff and puff that theymust be the exception! I’d say maybe 50/50, the really great ones are less in number, but that’s all down to personal taste, anyone listening to the top 40 won’t like all of them!

  • As you say, the Olympic Village is being used for residences, so there is no accommodation for athletes in London now. I fee sorry for Brazil. Everything is going wrong. Let’s hope the country can pull through with its plans.
    I must admit, I don’t watch the European Song Contest, although I admit it’s a grand way of understanding the differences between nationalities.

    • There is allegedly a lot of corruption involved with the Rio Olympics, altough to be fair to a lesser extent London also faced accusations of that. It will be interesting to see what happens, as there is no going back now, probably the US would be a better last minute replacement, much bigger facilities already there.

      The song contest does bring people together – it was a shame to see the Russians get booed, I could see why it happened, but 2 young 17 year old girls were doing their best, and doubtful they ordered any tanks anywhere.

    • Yes, I imagine if anywhere would be able to host an Olympics on only 2 years notice it would be the US, with the sporting facilities they have there. I suspect Rio will go ahead, but you never know..!

  • As you know I adored the Olympics but a rerun wouldn’t be the same. Part of what was incredible about 2012 was that we knew it was a one-off, at least for a good few years. I don’t watch Eurovision these days but I also remember Abba winning. I think it would be better if the UK didn’t take part, as we have a totally different attitude to it from other countries, I think. If we weren’t in it, I might be more likely to watch it, oddly!

    • Yes I agree that the exclusive nature of 2012 added to the buzz – in fact the one time I turned off the Olympics was in 1996 – partly because I was working at a holiday park and having a passionate fling with an 18 year old singer, and partly because it had only been in the US 12 years previously. It really needed Sydney to give the whole thing a shot of energy.

      There are other countries that have the same attitude as us, France hasn’t sent a serious entry for years! I can’t help myself, I love it, and my brother was a volunteer this year keeping the press in check, he loved it!

  • I do love the Olympics! And I agree with you, the IOC was putting a little shame on Rio to get them moving quicker in their preparations.

    Being from the US, I didn’t see the Eurovision Song Contest but the publicity angle is very interesting. I guess it’s like anything, you get noticed with publicity, whether it is good or bad.

    If our blogs received huge publicity, we’d be winners too! Well, we’re winners, we just now need to let the rest of the blogging community know that and build a fan base to hear us.

    I wish you much success,

    LeslieZ

    • Oh yes Leslie,
      You simply cannot beating building up a list of fans, because the relationship lends itself to long term benefits!

      I love my sport and my music, in fact have created products around both, and my new product features them both too!
      Onwards and upwards for us both!
      cheers,
      Gordon