How A.I. Is Transforming Sports at the 2024 Paris Olympics
Generative A.I. is taking many industries by storm, including sports. At this year’s Paris Olympics, the emerging technology is integrated into every part of the event to better the experience for both athletes and fans. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) recently launched the Olympic A.I. Agenda, an initiative to inspire A.I. use in Olympic games. Olympic partners worldwide seized the opportunity to showcase A.I. innovations, from chatbots for athletes to machine learning-generated performance recommendations for enhancing sleep quality at the Olympic Village.
A.I.’s integration into sports isn’t new. The NFL has partnered with Amazon Web Services (AWS) since 2017. Earlier this year, they created the A.I.-powered Digital Athlete tool to help NFL teams understand players’ needs to stay healthy and perform their best. The NBA has also embraced A.I. In February, it debuted a generative A.I. feature called NB-AI, designed to enhance and personalize live game experiences for fans by transforming game highlights into animated superhero movies.
At the Paris Olympics, A.I. is primarily playing a supporting role. For example, the IOC’s A.I.-powered monitoring system protects athletes from online abuse by flagging abusive social media messages for intervention. Athletes can use the A.I. chatbot AthleteGPT on the Athlete365 platform to get quick answers on social media guidelines, anti-doping rules and Rule 50 regulations, which prohibit political, racial or religious propaganda. Developed by Paris-based Mistral AI and powered by Intel’s Gaudi processors, the chatbot can quickly scour thousands of information pages and is accessible 24/7 only for athletes via the Athlete365 app. Intel also launched a pilot program with the IOC in Senegal to identify potential athletes in five villages, scanning over 1,000 children and identifying 40 with outstanding talent.
A scaled-down version of this system is on display in Paris. It allows fans at the Stade de France to mimic participation in various Olympic games, with an A.I. model evaluating their form and talent.
Behind the scenes, A.I. is also revolutionizing the Olympic games’ planning and execution. IOC’s Chief Technology Officer Ilario Corna said the committee has been gathering operational data since 2020 to improve management. For planning, the IOC used Intel’s digital twinning technology to create digital representations of venues, allowing them to foresee power needs, camera placements, and accessibility issues without being on-site.
In collaboration with commercial and broadcast partners, the IOC has also leveraged A.I. to enhance viewer experiences and enrich storytelling. Alibaba’s OBS Cloud, launched in September 2018, supports this year’s broadcast coverage and helps reduce the carbon footprint by transmitting Olympic-related content over the cloud.
Moreover, the Olympics’s official timekeeper, Omega, has partnered with the Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) to deliver faster, more relevant and insightful data through A.I. For instance, A.I.-based motion tracking technology is helping commentators and viewers track athletes’ positions during events such as canoe sprints, marathons, race walks, cycling, marathon swimming, rowing, sailing and triathlon.
Despite its promise, A.I.’s role in the Olympics has also sparked controversy. The latest involves Google’s withdrawal from its Olympic ad, which faced significant backlash. The ad titled “Dear Sydney” featured a father asking Google’s A.I. chatbot Gemini to help his daughter write a letter to her favorite athlete, U.S. hurdler and sprinter Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone. It showcased the draft produced by Gemini and concluded with footage of the girl running on the track with the text overlay, “A little help from Gemini.”
The ad drew criticism for portraying a young girl using A.I. to compose a fan letter, with some viewers feeling it undermined creativity and authenticity. As a result, Google decided to pull the ad. “While the ad tested well before airing, given the feedback, we decided to phase it out of our Olympics rotation. We believe A.I. can enhance human creativity but can never replace it,” Google said in a statement.
As the world watches these innovations unfold, the balance between leveraging A.I.’s benefits and addressing its challenges will shape the future of the Olympics and the broader intersection of technology and sport. Despite A.I.’s promising contributions, traditionalists and ethical concerns continue to push back, highlighting the need for a careful approach to integrating A.I. into sports.