The surf's up at Darling Harbour and you don't even have to put a toe in the water to ride the waves.
IBM unveiled a floating Surf Shack (cyber café) at Cockle Bay Wharf, Thursday. Adorned with a wave-like motif and massive gaudy surfboards the Shack is an ideally located tourist attraction -- set to soak up the hype of the Games.
The Surf Shack is home to 50 IBM Activa PCs that are linked directly to the FanMail network -- a cyber link which sends messages to athletes at a second Surf Shack set up in the Olympic Village.
"It was a significant investment," IBM's worldwide Olympic marketing manager, Al Dell'Aglio told ZDNet Australia -- although he wouldn't reveal the overall cost of the venture. "It's part of our overall marketing effort," he said.
The 2200 square foot floater will operate during the course of the Games with 130 voluntary hands on deck -- working in teams of 15.
The multi-lingual volunteers, who cover 28 languages between them, were recruited from the University of New South Wales and they'll work alongside four IBM technology experts to offer assistance to the 4000-5000 visitors the Shack has the capacity to hold each day.
The second cyber café -- located at the Olympic Village -- houses more than 60 IBM PCs. Here athletes can respond to FanMail messages and build their own home pages.
IBM claims that 3900 athletes have visited the Surf Shack set up in the Olympic Village since it opened, September 2 and that 23,000 FanMail messages have been sent to Olympians over the past week.
"If everyone sent one message to one athlete at the village, you'd be surprised at how that affects their performance," Australian track and field athlete, Jana Pittman said.
The floating Cyber cafe at Cockle Bay opened officially for free public use Friday.
