Another issue was in the choice of which events to cover. MSNBC would sometimes play USA athletes' performances over and over. Once would usually be enough, to make time for showing more sports venues.
This isn't just my opinion. Literally everyone I have talked to about the Olympic coverage did not like MSNBC's coverage.
Since the news broadcasts (which are plentiful for cord-cutters) left the actual event-centric coverage to the NBC streams, most of the coverage I saw was of non-event specific news, primarily negative.
They also start the Olympics with the walk of nations. Maybe not as many people care about that, but I love to see each team walk down the way in their national garb waving to the crowd.
This quote from the article was just so tone deaf:
[CEO of Time Warner’s Turner division] Martin said, “I wonder if there was less content available -- and people felt more compelled to tune in to the traditional network -- whether that would bolster ratings.”
To me the whole thing felt like an awful extended episode of The Today Show. Watered down to make it just digestible enough you might put up with it.
Couldn't figure out how to legally watch the Olympics, using any available device.
If a provider can't be bothered to supply a legal, payed option using tools available to a large segment of the population, perhaps their marketing department needs an overhaul.