> gab"I like gymnastics and track much better than swimming"by

One of the cool things that NBC did (I'm not certain if it's just them or if it's an international thing) was to subimpose country flags and lane markers in the swimming lanes. It was really neat to see a huge "Lane 4" and the Canadian flag (or whatever) apparently placed at the bottom of the pool when the turns were made to illustrate who was in the lead at that point.

It's an offshoot of what the NFL has been using for the virtual first down markers (anyone watching American football on television over the last two, three years knows what I'm talking about -- the yellow line).

What this does is place a graphic on a certain range of colors. When a recognizable movement occurs "above" the graphic, that part of the graphic is removed. It looked so realistic, that when I first saw all eight lane markers, I thought they were actual objects on the bottom of the pool. Then they vanished as the race started.

So far, the technology has been used in imaginative ways: the NFL's first down markers, the Olympic's swimming lane identifiers, ABC's covering up of the NBC logo in Times Square last New Year's...

How soon do you think it will be until we start seeing targeted ads displayed this way? For instance, instead of just having that revolving ad space behind home plate in baseball games (or under the official's table in basketball or by the faceoff circles in hockey), would we soon be seeing different ads in those places depending on demographics?

Will one day I'll be watching a hockey game up here in New Jersey and be viewing a billboard for Budweiser, while Silvercup in California sees a billboard for Pepsi in the same spot?

I say that'll happen in 2002.

In years to come, with the passive collection of information, I'll be able to watch a character in a movie drink a can of Dr Pepper, while my neighbor watches the same person drink a can of Pepsi, while my other neighbor sees Coca-Cola.

I'm not certain if it's a bad thing.

Just rambling on here.

-Faux "but I still think the lane markers were neat" Pas