Just found out via a blog post from Andrew Lark (who seems to like the Torino Conversations, thanx!) that the Japanese Olympic Committee is telling athletes not to open a weblog because they could get banned for that!

"The Japanese Olympic Committee is telling athletes competing at the Turin Winter Olympic Games not to open weblogs because the Olympic Charter bans athletes' journalist activities when the games are on, and violators will be disqualified."

Shin Taira, head of the JOC's business publicity department, said, "We are in trouble because there is no clear-cut standard to judge to what extent journalist activities are allowed, but diaries and detailed reports are no good during the Olympics period." [source]
this brings us back to the old discussion - is blogging journalism? (my opinion = NO). Blogging is much closer to conversation than to publishing. Yes, Blogs can be a complementary channel for prefessional journalism, BUT for 99% of the users it is pure conversation. That's why these kind of interviews are so useless.

But I will sit down in any of the Cafes around Piazza Solferino and start talking and as soon as 10 people are listening to me, I guess the IOC will approach me and ask me where I have my broadcasting license... ;-)