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The explosion in the use of social networking and smartphones in the past four years means the London 2012 Olympics will be the most tweeted, blogged and reported upon event in history.

Ironically, although the approximately 10,500 competitors are ensconced in the Olympic village behind 17 kilometres of four-metre-high electric fencing, they have probably never been more accessible to the public.

For such a carefully orchestrated and commercially controlled event as the Olympics, the thought of athletes running free and loose with their views rather than merely appearing at choreographed press conferences is anathema to the International Olympic Committee and commercial sponsors alike.

The IOC has looked to keep pace with the challenges thrown up by the social networking phenomenon with initiatives such as a social media hub that links internet users with athletes.

It has also drawn up guidelines on the use of social media - but this move is very much a gesture of futility nearly equal to that of King Canute, when he ordered the waves to retreat from the shore.

Since the Beijing Olympics, the number of Facebook users has surged to 900 million from just 100 million, while there are over 500-million active users on Twitter, compared to just 6 million in 2008.

Twitter has already claimed its first victim of the 2012 London Olympics, with Greek triple jumper Paraskevi Papachristou forced to pack her bags because of a racist tweet.

The uproar caused by her remark about West Nile mosquitoes and the number of Africans in Greece is yet another indication, if one was needed, of the ever-increasing power of social media.

Unlike the disgraced Papachristou, British gymnast Louis Smith waved goodbye to his Twitter followers when he moved into the Olympic village this week.

"It's important to show the public who we are, but this can reflect our whole life depending on what happens," he said. "I really want to put everything I can into this Olympic Games. If that means not tweeting and staying off Facebook then that's what I need to do."

Original post:
Social Media Changing the Olympic Reporting Landscape