The Beijing Olympic Games closed on Aug. 24, after drawing participants from a record 204 countries and regions competing in 302 events in 28 sports categories. Despite some worries before the games, there were no terrorist attacks, nor any other major troubles with the operation of the games.

Japanese newspapers devoted intensive coverage to the Beijing Olympics, splashing their front pages with images and stories for the 17-day duration of the event. With the exception of some violence by Chinese police against two Japanese journalists in the faraway Xinjiang region of northwest China, there were no serious troubles related to media coverage or newspaper production during the Games.

In the months before the start of the Beijing Summer Olympics, there had been much talk about possible terrorism, excessive air pollution, uncertainty over food safety and other potential problems. However, the event drew to a close without any significant troubles, although calls for increased media freedom and respect for human rights remained unanswered. In the end, most Japanese media organizations came to the common conclusion that the Beijing Olympics were “a general success.”

Japanese newspapers’ coverage of the Beijing Games was more extensive than that of the previous Games. During the Beijing Olympics, the three major national dailies - the Asahi, the Yomiuri and the Mainichi - used articles other than Games-related stories as their lead front-page news only five to eight times out of the total of 30 morning and evening issues distributed in the greater Tokyo areas

Masaomi Terada, deputy managing editor of the Yomiuri’s Tokyo head office, said that the prominent coverage of the Beijing Olympics was due in large part to the absence of other major news both at home and abroad. During the course of the Olympics, the Yomiuri issued a total of nine extra editions covering major news related to the Games.

In the case of the Kyodo News agency, it published almost two times the number of Beijing Games-related articles that it issued to its subscriber newspapers and broadcasters during the 2004 Athens Summer Olympics. According to Kyodo officials, the surge in coverage was the result of the submission of a large number of articles related to unrest in Tibet, the regulation of media activities by Chinese authorities, the diplomatic activities during the Games, and other issues in China unrelated to sports. The small time difference between Beijing and Tokyo made it easier to more frequently distribute updated and revised articles, they said. Kyodo News sent out about 300 Games-related photos per day during the Olympics, or almost twice as many as organizers sent out for the Athens Olympics.

Kyodo and the Mainichi Shimbun introduced an innovative image transmission system in cooperation with Nikon Corp. The system allowed photographers to transmit photographs automatically and simultaneously (from cameras equipped with wireless LAN cards) to the Main Press Center via a transmission system installed in the arena for swimming events. The system enabled Kyodo to distribute photos of Japanese swimmer Kosuke Kitajima’s triumph in the men’s 100-meter breaststroke a mere six minutes after the race ended. Norio Ogita, deputy managing editor at Kyodo News, said that it usually took at least 15 to 20 minutes to process and distribute the photos, adding that the six-minute feat was a new record.

Of the nine gold medals Japan won in Beijing, seven were back-to-back achievements by the same athletes. Japan won its first silver medal in the men’s fencing event and a bronze in the men’s “keirin” bicycle event. In addition, many Japanese athletes excelled in lower-profile sports including canoeing and the triathlon. In general, most media coordinated their coverage of the lower-profile minor events in advance.

Akihiro Kumada, deputy sports editor at the Mainichi, recalled that many Japanese athletes covered in pre-Olympics feature articles did perform at least as well as expected. For instance, Yuki Ota, who won the men's foil silver medal, had been relatively unnoticed, getting less exposure on TV prior to the Olympic Games. “For us, it was easier to cover him beforehand,” Kumada said.

On the contrary, ever since the Athens Olympics, personal agents acting as go-betweens for famous athletes have handled media requests for an interview, according to the Mainichi’s Kumada. “We had less chance to get any candid time with athletes. Sometimes, their agents overtly demanded cash for an interview. In some extreme cases, the agents asked for the insertion of advertisements by companies sponsoring their athletes,” he lamented.

Yoshio Sato, an assistant to the managing editor at the Asahi’s Tokyo head office, said that the coverage of sports news should be made rich in variety, as profile articles on star athletes tend to be overly stereotypical. “Readers are now a good judge. We need to get back to the grassroots and reconstruct the desired forum for sports journalism,” Sato said.

The Beijing Olympics has been called a great success. But some Japanese media officials said that they still felt a sense of discomfort. An overt display of national prestige and a showy rendition of the national anthem at the opening ceremony, characterized by synthetic images using computer graphics and lip-sync by performers, were among the causes of public dissatisfaction.

The administration and operations of the Games won high praise, especially for physical coordination. China had made detailed preparations and had staked its national prestige on success. Despite earlier worries, there was no trouble in the transmission of photos or article manuscripts. Mobile phones worked well at the main stadium, which accommodated 90,000 people, as did the wired LAN facility at the Main Press Center. However, the Chinese organizers showed signs of regulating the flow of information by, for instance, imposing a partial ban on access to Web sites within the Main Press Center.

At media conferences, the Chinese organizing committee repeatedly issued stereotypical replies to reporters’ questions. It also attempted to block any questions on politically sensitive issues. Norio Hagita, deputy managing editor at Kyodo News, said, “Such things could never take place in the West and it symbolizes the Chinese authorities’ attitude toward the media.”

Some Japanese reporters complained that numerous plain-clothed officers, apparently belonging to the security police, hung around on streets and that ordinary citizens appeared reluctant to answer reporters’ questions. On Aug. 4, there was an incident in which a reporter and photographer from two Japanese news organizations were detained and beaten by paramilitary police when they tried to cover a deadly attack on police in northwest China's Xinjiang region. Yoshiro Toriumi, head of the Sankei Shimbun’s Beijing Olympics Office, said that the world had expected to see an improvement in human rights in China, as well as an improvement in the freedom of the press as a result of the Beijing Olympics. “In this regard, China did not change at all,” he said.

However, some Japanese media figured out that compared to the recent past, China is indeed making marked progress when it comes to ensuring freedom in news-gathering activities for foreign journalists. Kenji Fujiyama, manager in charge of the sports division at Sports Nippon, recalled the days at the 1990 Asian Games in Beijing. “In those times, reporters were not allowed to interview people on streets without obtaining prior permission from the authorities. I was told that during the Beijing Olympics, no policemen tried to warn reporters when they were interviewing ordinary citizens on streets,” he said.

The Beijing Olympic Games also brought together a large number of journalists from world media organizations engaged in newsgathering in China. And the world is watching what kind of repercussions this might cause to China in the future. Takeshi Fujita, sports editor at the Mainichi’s Tokyo head office, said that the Beijing Olympics provided an opportunity for the Chinese public to recognize the international standards for media newsgathering. “I sincerely hope that this turns out to be a trigger for a progress toward greater media freedom in China,” he said.