Six Olympic Games Later, LA28’s AI Test Is Still a Human One

From Los Angeles in 1984 to Rio in 2016, technology kept changing the Olympic experience. The enduring measure of progress, however, has always been whether it helps athletes, reporters and fans understand one another more fully.

By Richard Awni | Senior Olympic and Sports Correspondent

Editor: Michelle Anne Paris

I have been fortunate to experience six Summer Olympic Games, beginning in Los Angeles in 1984 and continuing through Seoul, Barcelona, Beijing, London and Rio. Each host city used the best tools of its time to move people, tell stories and present extraordinary competition to the world.

The tools changed. The human reason for gathering did not.

Los Angeles 1984 showed that an Olympic Games could be both ambitious and disciplined. Peter Ueberroth’s organizing model, including major private sponsorship, helped produce a financial surplus and changed expectations for modern host cities. Seoul and Barcelona revealed how the Games could introduce a city and a culture to a global audience. Beijing demonstrated enormous scale. London paired spectacle with accessibility. Rio, despite the concerns that preceded it, gave me one of the warmest and most memorable Olympic experiences of my life.

In Rio, I watched Usain Bolt compete in two final races. The speed was unforgettable, but so was the crowd: families and visitors from around the world sharing a moment that no data point could fully capture. That is what the Olympic Games do at their best. They make the world feel both larger and closer.

LA28 will arrive in a different technological era. Artificial intelligence will help organize information, translate languages, support broadcast production, analyze performance, protect digital systems and connect audiences to events. The International Olympic Committee’s Olympic AI Agenda recognizes opportunities across athlete support, competition, operations and engagement. Its Trustworthy AI Framework also emphasizes fairness, transparency, privacy, security and human oversight.

Those principles cannot remain technical language in a policy document. They will have to guide decisions that affect real people.

An athlete should know how personal performance data is being used. A journalist should be able to distinguish verified information from an automated summary. A fan should be able to trust that a striking image or quotation is authentic. An official using technology to support a consequential decision must remain accountable for that decision.

AI can help reporters search transcripts, organize results and translate interviews. It can also repeat an error at extraordinary speed. The answer is not to reject the tool. The answer is to preserve a clear human chain of verification: who gathered the information, who checked it, who made the editorial judgment and who will correct the record if something is wrong.

The same standard should apply to the Olympic experience itself. Technology should reduce friction without turning the Games into an impersonal sequence of automated transactions. It should help a visitor find a venue, help a family understand a sport and help an athlete communicate across a language barrier. It should not replace the spontaneous contact that makes an international gathering meaningful.

Los Angeles has a special obligation because this city understands both media and reinvention. It is a global storytelling capital and a region shaped by many languages and cultures. LA28 can demonstrate that responsible AI is not only about protecting systems. It is about expanding access while protecting dignity.

For young people, that example matters. Family First Foundation has long connected sports and education because achievement requires more than talent. It requires judgment, preparation, teamwork and the ability to learn. AI should be taught in the same spirit: as a powerful assistant that still depends on informed, ethical people.

I am excited to see Los Angeles host the world again. I hope LA28 advances the Games as boldly as Los Angeles did in 1984. But the most important innovation will not be the fastest algorithm or the largest screen. It will be the decision to use every new capability in service of the athletes, the truth of the competition and the families who come together to witness it.

After six Olympic Games, that is the standard I would carry into a seventh: let technology improve the experience, but never allow it to become more important than the people the Games exist to serve.

Disclosure

Family First Foundation publishes Family First News Desk and founded the Artificial Intelligence Institute as an education initiative. Richard Awni is associated with both initiatives. This article is independent editorial commentary and is not sponsored by LA28, the IOC, USOPC or an Olympic commercial partner.