Oh I don't know each member of Australia's Olympic swimming team is set to earn a cool $10,000 - $15,000 for turning up at the Olympics. Gold medallists get an extra $35,000.

Many other Olympians who have to buy expensive equipment, like yatchs, get no pay.

Its only fair that $millions in advertising endorsement generally stays in the US where the most successful and cashed up Australian swimmers live.

In fact the more money Australian swimmers earn the quicker they retire - even at the height of their performance. The highest advertiser paid swimmers are getting more like AFL players each year - with a notable increase in violence and bad behaviour amongst the blokes.

Australia is all the poor due to high advertising pay for swimmers.

Planta

Hey Mal, of course our Olympic tradition has been trashed by commercial opportunism, money and drugs, so what’s wrong with that?

We have Dancing with the Stars, Biggest Loser, The Voice, Master Chef and dozens of variants. In each case we see the public pay good money to see those who have entered various journeymen trades very late, displace those who have dedicated their trade and professional training to a chosen career and been bypassed by those who are financially sponsored by commercial interests.

We used to call this a “market driven mechanism”. Bo!!0ck$, commercial interests have screwed every sporting and entertainment sector because? That’s what we “like to watch”.

Suck it up Princess.

I fail to see any evidence of sportsmanship here. It's all just win,win,win, nothing else seems to matter. We're supposed to empathise with those so-called athletes when they tell us how hard they have to train & how much the sacrifice. Well, I for one am not asking any of them to do it for me. If they're so ego laden that they go through all the hard yards then that's their problem, not ours. As for olympic spirit ? Don't make me laugh.

NSW is still paying the price of the 2000 Olympics.I visited the Munich Olympic facilities in 1979 and was told then by Germans not to believe anything they tell you about Olympics not costing the tax payer.

The Olympics is another big scam for Corporate entities to make huge profits at our expense.

Have the Olympics every 4 years in Greece and make the Corporates pay.

I have no understanding for the interest by people in spectating sports where they do not know the participants. Sure if I was mother/father/sister/friend etc I could understand watching and I can understand those who are participating being enthused but these are a bunch of strangers making no contribution to bettering society, so why is anyone else interested ? That there is any adulation attached is verging on repugnant, we would spend public money on this ?

Perhaps Choamsky was right and it's simply used to keep a public occupied and eyes away from serious matters, thus the public funds ?

I think the Olympic spirit is also lessened because athletes may represent a country they recently move to as opposed to their birth country. Similarly, some national teams use coaches from other countries. It's almost a sense of globalisation where the markets are all interconnected.