Have You Got What it Takes to Carry the Olympic Torch
If you're new here, you may want to sign up for email alerts or to subscribe to my RSS feed. Enjoy Life in the Fast Lane!
Lenovo, a worldwide leader in the PC market, is conducting a world-wide search for the world’s most innovative thinkers to participate in the Beijing 2008 Olympic Torch Relay. Do you have what it takes to carry the torch?
Selected ‘new thinkers’ will partake in the momentous China portion of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Torch Relay. Lenovo’s torchbearer selection program will utilize the Google platform for which search users and affiliated Web site visitors will be directed to Lenovo’s website by promotional links where you can register as an entrant to participate.
From now through September, you can register to enter the torchbearer search by submitting a 50 word essay in English explaining “What makes you a New Thinker for a New World?” At the end of September, 20 entrants will be selected to create and submit videos to YouTube demonstrating how you exhibit the Olympic ideals and new thinking.
Visitors will cast their votes on the videos in October, and the 3 videos with the highest votes will be nominated by Lenovo to be torchbearers for the 2008 Olympic Torch Relay.
“As a worldwide partner of the Olympic Torch Relay, we are very excited to bring torchbearer opportunities to the general public through Google. This is an innovative approach to torchbearer nomination.” said Deepak Advani, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer of Lenovo. “Using Google’s unsurpassed search and hosting platforms, we will invite people to nominate ‘new thinkers’ — those who embody our company’s philosophy and share in our global vision. New thinkers are representative of our passion for ingenuity and exemplify the entrepreneurial spirit.”
Do you consider yourself a ‘New Thinker’? One who approaches a situation with an innovative philosophy? One who finds creative solutions to bring about global change?
The Lenovo criteria for a ‘new thinker’
• Motivating – One who inspires the community to achieve goals and conquer obstacles
• Provocative – One who disregards traditional boundaries in carrying out a great and difficult endeavor
• Imaginative – One who thinks ‘outside the box’ – outside of national and cultural limitations
• Individualistic – One who demonstrates independence in both their thoughts and their actions
• Explorative – One who seeks new ways of doing and achieving
To show appreciation for ‘New Thinkers’ registering in the campaign, Lenovo will run weekly promotions awarding Lenovo Olympic pins, Olympic Torch-themed notebook PCs, and even the real Olympic Torch itself. Lenovo, winner of multiple awards in PC design, is also the designer of the 2008 Olympic Torch.
How to enter
• From now through to September 30, 2007: Register to enter the search for the Lenovo ‘New Thinker’ Torchbearer nominees and submit your essay.
• October 1-3, 2007: Submitted essays will be screened by a panel of judges, and 20 finalists and 10 alternates will be selected to submit video selections for the final contest.
• October 3-7, 2007: Finalists and alternates will complete and submit their videos for the Final Voting Competition.
• October 10, 2007: The voting begins! Visitors can view the 20 videos and vote for their favorite contestants.
o Visitors can vote for up to 3 contestants.
o After submitting the votes, voters can choose to enter a random drawing for one of three Lenovo-designed “Cloud of Promise” Beijing 2008 Olympic Torches. The torch – with its color, shape, decoration and texture – reflects the traditions and history of the Beijing Olympic Games and its host nation.
• October 24, 2007: The top 3 contestants will be submitted to Beijing Organizing Committee as Lenovo torchbearer nominees for the 2008 Olympic Torch Relay route in China.
Register Now.
Olympic Torch Relay route
The official torch lighting will take place in Olympia, Greece, in March 2008. The torch will travel to 22 cities across 5 continents before spending 97 days traveling to more than 100 cities in Mainland China. It will arrive at its final destination in Beijing on August 8, 2008, marking the start of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. It’s the longest Torch Relay ever in Olympic history with more cities visited than any Games in the past.
Validated by IOC, the Olympic Flame will be lit in Olympia, Greece according to tradition on March 25, 2008. From March 25 – 30, the Torch Relay will travel across Greece, ending at the Panathinaiko Stadium, the site of the first modern Olympic Games in 1896. After the handover ceremony in the stadium, the Olympic Flame will arrive in Beijing on March 31, 2008. In Beijing, a ceremony will be held for the arrival of the flame into China and Beijing 2008 Olympic torch relay will commence.
Olympic Torch Bearer Worldwide Nomination
Torch for Beijing 2008 Olympic Games
Beijing 2008 Olympic Games Dream
View an amazing glimpse of China
About Lenovo
Lenovo is dedicated to building the world’s best engineered personal computers. Lenovo’s business model is built on innovation, operational efficiency and customer satisfaction as well as a focus on investment in emerging markets. Formed by Lenovo Group’s acquisition of the former IBM Personal Computing Division, the company develops, manufactures and markets reliable high-quality, secure and easy-to-use technology products and services worldwide. Lenovo has major research centers in Yamato, Japan; Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen, China, and Raleigh, North Carolina.
What a wonderful iniative by Lenovo !!!!…………
congratulations on your authorative and motivational post Deborah!!!!!
You have my mind racing now – trying to think who I would deem worthy of the honor of carrying the torch. If the prize were to go to a blogger, you would be definitely in the running of course Deborah
. A quick recap of your blog posts made me think that the Edinburgh scientists who are turning peanut butter into diamonds would be a contender. I think they would qualify for being innovative, imaginative, thinking outside the box and they would definitely motivate me to buy peanut butter.
Seriously though this will be an interesting contest to follow. If you could nominate someone who would it be Deborah?
Thanks Kim
It’s certainly an interesting means to nominate some of the torch bearers.
Haha, thanks Sue, it would be fun, but beyond my skills for doing a video, let alone finding the time to leave the business for the duration.
I’d have a difficult time myself to limit my choices to 3 individuals, but it’s not directed mainly at blogs or websites. Absolutley anyone can be nominated or register themselves.
As for someone who continually thinks outside the box, a young man named Colin who’s been known to flutter by this blog comes to mind
this is an nice and intresting post…nice job…
I really wanted to run with the torch but never knew where to apply. I live in Essex County Canada all my life and I have been in alot of athletic competitions in school. All my life I wanted to be in Olympics I was a great runner. I loved to run. Although we had nbo transportation as a young girl to get me to events. I am partially handicapped from an accident I have a metal plate in my neck and I have been cut on my hip as well. I have lost some mobility but not aLL OF IT. I really want to run just even a half mile or even a mile in my Hometown Amherstburg,Ontario If that dream for me can come true just to be a part of it and feel that i had been a runner at one point of my life. Just really want to be a part of history and have some of my life back and feel that spirit back in my life I want to feel alive again with that feeling of hope for all the people in my country who had battled cancer and muscular/MS and depressive behavioural symptoms and other related that are affected in Windsor and Essex County. Please consider Thankyou Lorie Aston 519-944-1888