The Final Medal Counts

By popular demand, this is an update to my previous post looking at the final Beijing 2008 Summer Olympic Medal rankings by GDP, population, and a few other things:

Athletes from 86 countries received at least one medal.

The Bahamas receive top honors for total number of medals in proportion to their population. (2 medals and a population of around 307,451), followed by Jamaica and Iceland. Armenia drops to ninth place. Guess the islands got something.

Top 10 - Ranked by Total Medals to Population
Rank	Country	Gold Medals	Total Medals	Population
1	Bahamas	0	2	307,451
2	Jamaica	6	11	2,804,332
3	Iceland	0	1	304,367
4	Slovenia	1	5	2,007,711
5	Australia	14	46	20,600,856
6	New Zealand	3	9	4,173,460
7	Norway	3	10	4,644,457
8	Cuba	2	24	11,423,952
9	Armenia	0	6	2,968,586
10	Belarus	4	19	9,685,768

Meanwhile, Zimbabwe led for number of medals in proportion to per capita GDP, followed by China and Kenya.

Top 10 - Ranked by Total Medals to Per Capita GDP
Rank	Country	Gold Medals	Total Medals	Per Capita GDP
1	Zimbabwe	1	4	$ 179
2	China	51	100	$ 5,256
3	Kenya	5	14	$ 1,551
4	Ethiopia	4	7	$ 795
5	Cuba	2	24	$ 4,474
6	Russia	23	72	$ 14,840
7	Ukraine	7	27	$ 6,960
8	North Korea	2	6	$ 1,704
9	Uzbekistan	1	6	$ 2,269
10	US	36	110	$ 45,553

Pakistan is the most populous country not to receive any medals, followed by Bangladesh and the Philippines. The 10 largest countries not to receive any medals are:

Country	Population
Pakistan	167,762,040
Bangladesh	153,546,901
Philippines	92,681,453
Congo	66,514,506
Burma	47,758,181
Tanzania	40,213,162
Uganda	31,367,972
Nepal	29,519,114
Peru	29,180,899
Iraq	28,221,181
Saudi Arabia	28,161,417

The 5 smallest countries to receive medals:

Country	Population
Iceland	304,367
Bahamas	307,451
Bahrain	718,306
Trinidad and Tobago	1,047,366
Estonia	1,307,605

Within the Axis of Evil North Korea led in total medals, gold medals, medals to population, and medals to per capita GDP. Iraq was pretty much out of the running

Country	Gold	Total	Population	Per Capita GDP
North Korea	2	6	23,479,089	$1,704
Iran	1	2	65,875,223	$11,431
Iraq	0	0	28,221,181	$3,625

For additional rankings, check out the links on this previous post.

1000 Cameramen Named Bob at Beijing Olympics

If you've been watching the Olympics you may have noticed a multitude of cameramen wearing blue tunics emblazoned in large white letters "BOB."

No, their names are not all Bob. Actually, it stands for Beijing Olympic Broadcasting, which shoots video and radio for the media pool.

The left picture is of a BOB cameraman in action, and the second picture is of Ma Guoli, COO of BOB, in front of headquarters in 2005.

BOB projects their broadcasts will reach a "cumulative worldwide audience of more than 30 billion people", which is impressive considering there are only ~6.6 billion people in the world.

Armenia leads Olympic Medal Count

UPDATE 28 AUG 08: NEW POST WITH UPDATED FINAL STANDINGS

The Wall Street Journal today noted a controversy over the Olympic medal count, whether to rank countries by their total medal count (the US convention) or by the number of gold medals. The Beijing Olympic page ranks countries by the count of gold medals, which places China in first with 17 golds and the US in second with 10 golds, even though the US has won 29 medals overall, compared to China's 27.

The controversy is more stark further down the list. For example, Zimbabwe with 3 silvers is ranked behind Thailand with one gold, and Ukraine with 4 bronzes is behind Vietnam with one silver.

As the WSJ notes, the danger of ranking by gold medals instead of total medals is that some countries (Australia, Japan, France, Germany) are already cutting funding for sports that don't have a shot at being number one.

Usually no statistical method gives a complete picture, and the medal count is no exception. Let's take a look here at how the medal count would look if we weighted the medals counts different ways, for example, by the country's population or per capita GDP. (This is using population and GDP purchasing power parity data from the CIA Factbook, and the medal count as of this morning 13 August 2008 around 10am EST).

As you can see on the below tables, the US drops to a still respectable 9th place when measuring total medals to per capita GDP. China, still a developing country, stays in second place, and Georgia closely trails Russia.

When measuring medals to total population, Armenia is the winner with 3 medals for a population of less than 3 million. Neither the US, China, or Russia makes the top ten of that ranking. If the US won as many medals as Armenia per population, then the US would have over 300 medals.

The point is that there are multiple legitimate ways to measure medal success, and we would do well to remember that the goal of the Olympic movement is "to contribute to building a peaceful and better world by educating youth through sport practised without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play." Of course it's far easier to just count medals.

Ranked by Total Medals to Per Capita GDP
Rank	Country	Gold	Total	GDP per capita
1	Zimbabwe	0	3	$179
2	China	17	27	$5,256
3	North Korea	1	7	$1,704
4	Togo	0	1	$889
5	Kyrgyztan	0	2	$1,960
6	Russia	2	12	$14,840
7	Georgia	2	3	$4,427
8	Cuba	0	3	$4,474
9	US	10	29	$45,553
10	Tajikistan	0	1	$1,639
Ranked by Total Medals to Population
Rank	Country	Gold	Total	Population
1	Armenia	0	3	2,968,586
2	Georgia	2	3	4,630,841
3	Australia	4	12	20,600,856
4	Switzerland	1	4	7,581,520
5	Slovenia	0	1	2,007,711
6	Finland	1	2	5,244,749
7	Kyrgyztan	0	2	5,356,869
8	Azerbaijan	1	3	8,177,717
9	Slovakia	1	2	5,455,407
10	Mongolia	0	1	2,996,081