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Opinion on London hosting the Olympics has been varied to say the least with as many people dreading the impending start of the games as those who can't wait for it to begin.
Now the London Eye will be used as a gauge to show how popular the event is during the course of the games.
The London Eye will be lit up each night in relation to the degree of positive or negative feedback to the event on Twitter that day in the world's first ever social media-driven lightshow.
Olympic opinion lightshow: If the Twitter feedback on the Games is 75 per cent positive that day, three quarters of the London Eye will light up the same night
Display breakdown: The 24 minute lightshow will give a run down of what happened at the Olympics that day
EDF energy, which sponsors the wheel, will be analysing comments on the website to determine how positive people are feeling about the Olympics.
If the reaction is mixed the London Eye will only be half lit whereas if the nation's opinion is 75 per cent positive three quarters of the wheel will light up.
The 24 minute show will start each night of the games at 9pm with every minute of the display representing one hour - giving a 24-hour light representation of the nation's feeling toward the games.
The lightshow will also include displays of the Union Flag and gold, silver or bronze lighting, dependent on the colour of the medals Team GB bring home.
Twitter users are being encouraged to give their feedback to the games by tweeting #energy2012.
The lightshow was launched by Daley Thompson, who won gold in the decathlon at the 1980 and 1984 Olympics in Moscow and Los Angeles, who said it means a lot for athletes to know their country is supporting them.
Lighting up the night: Athlete Daley Thompson launches the world's first social media-driven light show at the London Eye reflecting how positive the nation is feeling about London 2012 every night of the Games
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He said: 'Hosting the Games in London is an incredible once in a lifetime event and as a passionate supporter of the Games I want everyone to get behind the athletes and really show their support.
'We need to get behind our favourites to power them onto gold. EDF Energy of the Nation gives you a really easy way to join in, wherever you are and help drive a world first every night on the EDF Energy London Eye - a light show powered by the nation’s tweets.'
Justin Manor, Founder of Sosolimited who developed the technology for the lightshow, said: 'The algorithm we developed converts real-time social emotions into colour and motion – tweets to light show.
How it works: EDF Energy will filter Tweets throughout the day to gauge the public's opinion of the games
'We distil 24 hours of action into a 24 minute visual concert that embodies the emotional peaks and troughs of the day.
'Being able to light up the EDF Energy London Eye every night is a one of a kind of experience both for us and anyone who wants to join in on Twitter.'
Gareth Wynn, EDF London 2012 Programme Director, added: 'London 2012 will be celebrated through a series of remarkable moments that will be captured and shared by millions instantly on social media.
'Energy of the Nation pushes boundaries by allowing people to get behind the Games on Twitter and see the emotion of these key moments represented each night on this globally recognised icon of London.'
If you don't happen to be near the London at 9pm during the games the show will also be live-streamed every day at edfenergyofthenation.com
London 2012: IOC chief praises 'country that invented modern sport' - The Guardian
In the week of the opening ceremony, the International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said he was optimistic the London Games would be a success thanks to the enthusiasm of "the country that invented modern sport".
Rogge, who chaired an IOC executive board meeting on Saturday, said he was "satisfied" with the security situation and "reassured" following presentations from the Locog chairman Lord Coe and the government in the wake of the G4S shambles that has dominated the lead-up to Friday's opening ceremony.
Rogge said he believed London's event would be a "very good" Games with its own unique identity hewn from the sporting heritage of Great Britain and the athletes who had arrived so far were "ecstatic" with the facilities.
"What I believe will be very visible is the identity of the London Games," he said. "You could say when we went to Athens that it was coming back to the roots of Olympism because of Greece having invented the Olympic Games; in Beijing it was the most populous country in the world," said Rogge, who arrived in London on Friday. "Going to London, it's going to the country that invented modern sport in the second half of the 19th century, included sport in its school curriculum, loves sport, knows sport well. This will come out of these Games."
However, he added that the "proof of the pudding would be in the eating" and that no final verdict could be delivered until the closing ceremony. The Belgian insisted that the call for 3,500 troops, taking the total to 17,000, with a further 1,200 on standby, to deal with shortfalls from G4S had not affected security plans and called for the media to "move on".
On another of the issues that dogged London organisers last week, when everything from the weather to transport and preparations for the opening ceremony came under scrutiny, Rogge said he was confident Locog would take a "common sense", "subtle" approach to protecting Olympic sponsors.
Coe last week suggested that spectators in a Pepsi T-shirt would not be allowed entry because Coca-Cola was a Games sponsor, although he later insisted he had misunderstood the question. "Individual cases will not be pursued with police, but if there is really a blatant intent of ambush marketing by another company or by a group of people with commercial views, then of course we will intervene," he said. "If you have the T-shirt of a competitor of one of our sponsors, we will not intervene."
Rogge said he had "sympathy" for those affected by the Games lanes that come into operation on Wednesday. But he added: "We know the country wants the Games, loves the Games. We'll try and keep the disruption to a low level."
Rogge resisted calls from President Barack Obama for the terrorist attack at the 1972 Munich Games to be recognised by a minute's silence during the opening ceremony, insisting "the opening ceremony is an atmosphere that is not fit to remember such a tragic incident". Instead the IOC will hold a ceremony at the exact place of the killings in the military airport in Munich on 5 September, the date of the tragedy.The IOC president, in charge of his final Olympics before he stands down in 2013, also confirmed that the National Olympic Committee executives identified in a Sunday Times investigation would be free to attend the Games.
It was initially thought that the IOC would try and get interim suspensions in place for the most serious cases, but Rogge said the fact the Sunday Times took two weeks to hand over a large file of evidence made the timescale impossible.
London Olympics opening ceremony soundtrack to be released immediately after event - NME
July 21, 2012 15:57
Music from the opening ceremony of the London 2012 games will go on sale at 12am July 28
Photo: London 2012
The soundtrack to the London Olympics' opening ceremony will go on sale to the general public shortly after the event at midnight Saturday (July 28).
The music from the ceremony, which will mark the start of the 2012 London Olympics, will be released digitally and will feature new tracks by Underworld and songs from artists who will perform on the night from the Olympic stadium.
As organisers of the games want to keep who is performing at the opening ceremony a secret, Decca/Universal – the record label behind the release – have kept the track listing a secret so as not to spoil any potential surprises. However, last month, a leaked document revealed Arctic Monkeys, Amy Winehouse and Muse may appear on the soundtrack.
Paul McCartney, who has already announced he will be playing a few of his songs at the event and Underworld, who have have been named as the opening ceremony's music directors, are likely to appear on the album.
'A Symphony of British Music: Music For The Closing Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games', an album containing music performed on the final night, will be released digitally on August 12.
Muse's 'Survival' has been named the official song of the London 2012 Olympics. You can hear the track, which will be played when athletes enter the stadium, in the lead up to the medal ceremony and also as the theme for all international TV coverage, below.
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London Eye light show to measure Olympic moaning on Twitter - Crave
Oh this'll go well. The London Eye is to be turned into a giant sentiment tracker, with a huge light show displaying how people on Twitter are feeling about the Olympic Games.
It's a move that makes you want to shake someone by the shoulders and yell, "Have you seen how much people are moaning already? What do you think is going to happen?"
Launched by feisty Olympic legend Daley Thompson, of button-bashing 8-bit fame, the show will start at 9pm every night the Games are on. Positive tweets will colour the wheel gold, the Metro reports; negative will make it purple. Eye sponsor EDF Energy reckons it's the first disaster waiting to happen social media-driven lightshow.
There's an accompanying hashtag, #Energy2012, which is already full of rude and politically charged tweets.
"Sorry Daley Thompson, but the Olympics can smooch my wrinkly b******. #Energy2012," tweets the charming @DocHackenbush.
@anarchic_teapot makes a more serious point. "The LOCOG branding rules are vicious, petty and damaging to the image of the event #Energy2012."
"People are going hungry in this country while we blow billions on running and jumping," objects @justmckeat.
Almost all the 'positive' tweets in the hashtag are simply saying 'cool idea' or similar. The only genuinely positive one I could see was @JoelStMethodist, and he's just bored. "Cannot wait for the Olympics to start," he tweets. "So bored of having nothing to watch in the 600+ channels #Energy2012."
EDF assures me all Olympic-related tweets will be parsed by its amazing sentiment-divining algorithm, not just ones on its easily merked hashtag.
Most British people are positive or at least not bothered about the Games, with a survey by Ofcom earlier this week finding that 49 per cent of people are quite or very interested in the Olympics, with a further 11 per cent neither interested or uninterested. I don't know how you can be neither interested or uninterested in something, but I guess it just means 'don't care'. Forty-one per cent were 'not very interested' or 'not at all interested'.
But it's the moaners who run the discussion, who rant the most on social networks, who give reporters good quotes. Not that there's nothing to moan about -- the CNET team is mainly going to be working from home during the Games, because public transport is likely to be delayed and overcrowded.
London has become semi-militarised, with warships in the river and rockets on roofs. And the crass brand policing and naked commercialisation would make Pierre de Coubertin turn in his grave, not to mention the vast expense to us all.
Chin up, stiff upper lip, what what
Despite all this, I think the Olympics is still capable of the most extraordinary human moments that bring us all together. I'll never forget watching Michael Johnson destroy the 200m world record in 1996 (I was in an Ikea in France), or the spectacular vista behind the high diving board in Barcelona.
I laughed in amazement at Usain Bolt winning the 100m apparently without trying. And shed a few unmanly tears at the magnificent Kelly Holmes realising she had just won, after decades of injury and heartbreak.
These are moments to make your soul soar, and there will be more of them here in London. Besides, we last hosted the world's greatest party in 1948 and I think it's well past time we put our hands in our pockets and stood a round.
So chin up, London, put on your best brave face, and try to enjoy it. And if you want to tweet something negative, leave off the hashtag, there's a good chap. I'll leave the final word to good old Daley:
"We want to make the EDF Energy London Eye a spectacular showcase of national support for the athletes -- and one that will inspire them every night of the Games."
Update: A previous version of this story stated that only tweets with the #Energy2012 hashtag would contribute to the sentiment tracker -- this isn't the case.
London set for a 'mind blowing 100m final' - The Voice
ADMISSION: Tyson Gay
WITH THE four fastest men on the planet all on one track, the men’s 100m final is set to be the biggest spectacle at London 2012 and American Tyson Gay admits that with such a strong field, breaking the 9.8s barrier is unlikely to enough for a medal this time round.
Only Usain Bolt has run 9.7s or faster in an Olympic final- when he broke the world record in Bejing with a time of 9.69s. The second best time in that event was 9.89s by Trindad’s Richard Thompson and prior to 2008, the Olympic record for the 100m was 9.84s set in Atlanta in 1996 by Canadian Donovan Bailey.
Gay believes this time round, it is going to require an incredible effort just to be on the podium.
“'I really truly believe that.It will take a 9.7 to even get a medal,” he said
“'It is mind blowing to think four or five people even have the possibility of doing that (9.7) in one race.”
The favourite, and the world’s fastest man Usain Bolt, ran 9.58s in Berlin in 2009 but his training partner and current World Champion Yohan Blake sent shockwaves around the Jamaican National Stadium during the Olympic trials when finished ahead of Bolt, setting the best time this year of 9.75s in the process.
Also in the mix is former world record holder Asafa Powell, who set 9.72s back in 2008 and Justin Gatlin, who finished first in the US trials in Eugene with a personal best of 9.80s.
Gay himself matched Bolt’s Beijing time in Shanghai in 2009, making him the second fastest man ever, but injuries have plagued him in recent years.
He had hip surgery in 2011 and this kept him off the track for a year and he only ran his first race in June. He finished second in the US trials to confirm his spot in London.
After such injury woes, some might suggest that Gay should be happy even to just be at the Games but the American has higher ambitions- to make his medal collection complete.
The sprinter secured three gold medals at the 2007 World Championships but injury hampered his performances in Beijing and he is hoping to finally get the Olympic medal he craves:
“'That (a medal) is the missing piece. I ask somebody every day how many days left till we start. I think about it constantly.
“I am confident I can run 9.7 or better. I don't think I have a choice but to.”
London 2012 Olympics medal target is 'aspirational' - Daily Telegraph
To allow the athletes to better handle the pressure of competing on home soil, Sir Clive Woodward, deputy chef de mission, said they have prepared videos about other countries' athletes talking about how to cope with the weight of expectation, including some from Austalia and China.
"I think the more knowledge you've got the better chance you have of applying it and the more you can think about this. The longer you think ahead of the event, the better chance youve got coming into this environment, just staying in line and doing your job, reaching your personal best, hopefully winning. So it's no different to taking penalties, it's to understand the process, an understanding of how you should be practicing it. "
The BOA and Team GB officials refused to be drawn into detail about who will be the flag bearer of the home team at the opening ceremony, saying that an announcement will be made on Monday.
HIGHWAY TO L - Daily Star
AS I type this, my teenage son has just disappeared down the road in a driving schools Vauxhall Corsa.
Ive just block-booked him ten hours of driving lessons with his instructor for the not unreasonable sum of 220.
Its a strange feeling.
Not spending the 220 but the sense of helplessness.
Your offspring in the hands of a stranger whos teaching them the most important life-saving skill theyll ever master.
Still, best left to the professionals, I suppose.
After mastering the lethal art of crossing a busy road, youngsters face the next big challenge in their lives driving a car.
Considering youve just been granted the responsibility of plotting the kinetic path of a tonne of steel on wheels, our UK driving test is pretty basic.
Most fatal or serious accidents occur on rural roads and testosterone, it would appear, is the main cause.
Reversing round corners, mastering the exaggerated mirror-signal manoeuvre and performing a hill start without frying the clutch are one thing.
But understanding what a car does on the razor-edge of grip is a different matter.
Where is the test section regarding lift-off over-steer or using ABS to its full advantage?
Dynamics are possibly the most important part of controlling a car, so why isnt this part of the training and test?
Those lessons are only learned on a broad expanse of tarmac well away from the public road or in real life.
Problem is, in real life the only escape routes are usually full of oncoming vehicles or trees. This is compounded by the fact most young motorists drive small, older cars that will never fare as well in a crash as a bigger, newer car.
Most of us get lucky lucky to survive our teens and lucky to be able to capitalise on the near-misses and narrow scrapes. Insurance companies call that experience, not luck.
But shouldnt the Government be doing more?
Locating test centres at branches of Halfords might be convenient but it doesnt address the inadequate driver training weve currently got in place.
The fact KSI (killed or seriously injured) statistics were up this year lends weight to that argument.
Heres a shocking fact: In 2011, 25,023 people were killed or seriously injured on the road, an increase of 2% from 2010 and the first annual rise since 1994.
Me and my boy are off to a disused airfield to do some skids and drifts the moment hes passed his test.
London 2012 Olympics: South Sudan's Guor Marial allowed to compete under Olympic flag in London - Daily Telegraph
"The voice of South Sudan has been heard," said Marial. "The South Sudan has finally got a spot in the world community. Even though I will not carry their flag in this Olympic Games, the country itself is there. The dream has come true. The hope of South Sudan is alive."
Marial said he'll ask his father – who still lives in South Sudan – to travel to the nearest city to watch him compete on TV.
He added: "Most important is the people of South Sudan. They struggle so much, so if I can accomplish something, I can help,"
"That's why every morning, I get up, I put on my shoes and I train."
New Hampshire senator Jeanne Shaheen lent support to Marial's Olympic bid by sending a letter to the IOC appealing for the athlete to compete under the Olympic flag.
The IOC Executive Board's decision will see him march under the IOC flag at the opening ceremony on Friday along with three athletes from the former Netherlands Antilles.
Those athletes have refused to run for the Netherlands since their former country ceased to officially exist in 2010.
At the 1992 Barcelona Games, competitors from Yugoslavia competed under the Olympic flag because of the break-up of the country, which left them with no national team. They didn't march at the opening ceremony but the Olympic flag was raised on their behalf during award ceremonies.
Four athletes from East Timor were allowed in under the Olympic flag in Sydney in 2000 because East Timor wasn't an independent country.
The IOC had said that Kuwaiti athletes could compete as independents in the London Games after suspending the country's Olympic committee in 2010 because of government interference. However, they have since lifted the Kuwaiti ban.
Drink-driver four times the limit - Grimsby Telegraph
A WOMAN who drove into a water-filled ditch while more than four times over the legal alcohol limit, has received a suspended prison sentence.
Alison Hanson, 48, of Wragholme Road, Grainthorpe, admitted driving her Vauxhall Corsa after consuming so much alcohol that the proportion in her breath was 142mcg. The legal limit is 35mcg.
Jim Clare, prosecuting at Skegness Magistrates' Court, said the driver of a car following her at around 7.30pm on June 15 saw her driving in the centre of Fire Beacon Lane in Covenham and almost forcing a van off the road.
She then tried to turn at a junction but failed and drove into the ditch.
Police and an ambulance were called but she was not injured and was arrested after failing a breath test.
In mitigation, Terry Boston said she was "absolutely distraught" about what had happened.
He said she was of previous good character but was going through traumatic circumstances.
After standing the case down for a report from a probation officer, District Judge John Stobart told her that her act was "criminally stupid".
He said the level of alcohol in her system was beyond the report's recommendation of a community sentence and he was imposing a 56-day term of imprisonment, suspended for a year.
He also ordered that Mrs Hanson be disqualified from driving for 27 months.
In addition, he ordered she would have to attend a drink-drivers' rehabilitation programme which, if successfully completed, would reduce her disqualification period by six months.
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