According to NBC on August 9, the Beijing Olympic Opening Ceremony, broadcasted by NBC, was very popular in American audience and received the highest ratings among any other Olympic Opening Ceremony outside America.

NBC claims that Beijing's Olympic Opening Ceremony ratings climbed to 21.5 percent, which is only lower than the 27 percent ratings during the Atlanta Olympic Opening Ceremony in 1996.

NBC's data also shows that people browsed on NBC.com about the Beijing Olympic Opening Ceremony 70 million times.

Because of the time difference, NBC did not broadcast the Opening Ceremony of Beijing Olympics live; and broadcasting in eastern and western America was delayed about 12 and 15 hours respectfully. Many American audiences were dissatisfied with this arrangement and asked NBC to broadcast the Olympic Opening Ceremony live in the future.

By People's Daily Online