谁才是美国最大的媒体公司？答案可能出人意料。不论是收入还是市值，康卡斯特（Comcast）均领先于迪士尼（Disney）、新闻集团（News Corp）和时代华纳（Time Warner）等众多竞争对手。公司的发展速度连其CEO布莱恩·罗伯茨都感到惊讶。康卡斯特由罗伯茨的父亲成立于密西西比州图帕罗市，最初只是一家小型有线电视公司，如今这家公司已经拥有NBC环球（NBCUniversal）的多数股份，并且是美国最大的有线电视运营商（截至目前），最大的住宅互联网服务提供商，美国第三大电话公司。53岁的罗伯茨最近接受了《财富》杂志（Fortune）杰夫·科尔文的采访，他在采访中讲到了公司报道去年夏季奥运会的经验，继续转变的商业模式等。以下为采访内容节选：

    问：彼得·德鲁克的经典问题之一：你们从事的是什么行业？

    答：很明显，我们可能是独一无二的跨界企业，现在的业务综合了媒体与技术。康卡斯特NBC环球拥有令人不可思议的品牌组合，并且我们可以通过多种方式将这些品牌和体验提供给消费者。我们不再是一家单纯的有线电视公司或广播公司。我们现在正处于媒体与技术变革的前沿。

    融合媒体与技术的一个很好的例子，就是你们对奥运会的报道，这似乎正是你在收购NBC时预想的一种模式。每一项体育赛事都通过各种设备在线直播，同时也会通过传统电视媒介进行直播或转播。你将此次报道称为一场试验。你从中学到了什么？

    我从中学到了很多东西。我们的第一要务是努力不在奥运会上赔钱。考虑到之前几届奥运会的情况，似乎我们肯定会赔钱。所以，最终能实现收支持平衡，甚至还有少量的利润，我们觉得很幸运。我们已经决定在2020年之前，继续奥运会报道，这一决定需要公司投入数十亿美元（44亿美元），而去年公司在奥运会上的表现为我们开了一个好头。

    我们曾经预测，公司在伦敦奥运会的收入将比北京奥运会减少10%。毕竟，在北京奥运会上，迈克尔·菲利普斯曾经狂揽八块金牌，还有谁能超越他？而且，（北京）时区距离我们太远，因此许多赛事均在美国现场直播，而对于在美国现场直播，欧洲最为困难。因此，我们预测伦敦奥运会收入较前一届将减少10%，结果却是增加了10%。原因何在？这是因为NBC充分利用了社交媒体。此外，我们还利用了所有网络【NBC、CNBC、MSNBC、波多黎各电视台（Telemundo）、Bravo电视台、美国有线广播网（USA Network）等】，而不是仅限一种渠道。电视直播时长也创下了历史记录。我们将每一场比赛放到网上直播，并开发了移动应用。而通过笔记本电脑或手机，我们借助公司的有线电视服务Xfinity，提供关于每一位美国运动员的点播信息。在17天里，我们完成了4,000万至5,000万次点播服务。

    这样一来，公众就可以有足够多的方式接触和体验奥运会，这预示着未来模式的前途一片光明。与其他任何媒体或电信公司不同，目前，我们有能力将一项正在发生的赛事或一条新闻或一部电影，在一个极其分散的世界里尽可能广泛地传播。

    电话行业是你正在大规模参与的另外一项事业。语音电话已经成为一项无线业务，但你却卖掉了公司的无线频谱。你对未来是怎样看的？

    America's biggest media company isn't what you think. Comcast (CMCSA) takes in more revenue and commands a higher market value than Disney (DIS), News Corp. (NWSA), Time Warner (TWX), or any other competitor. Even CEO Brian Roberts marvels at how the company has risen. Founded by his father as a small cable-TV system in Tupelo, Miss., Comcast is now majority owner of NBCUniversal, as well as the country's largest cable operator (by far), the largest residential Internet service provider, and the third-largest phone company. Roberts, 53, talked recently with Fortune's Geoff Colvin about what he learned from last summer's Olympic coverage, continually changing the business model, and much else. Edited excerpts:

    Q: The Peter Drucker question: What business are you in?

    A: We're now clearly in the cross-section, maybe uniquely, of media and technology. Comcast NBCUniversal has an incredible array of brands and ways to deliver those brands and experiences for consumers. We're no longer a cable company or a broadcaster. We're right at a cusp of change in media and technology.

    An example of media and technology was your coverage of the Olympics, which seemed to be a model of what you envisioned when you bought NBC. These events were streamed live online through every kind of device and also broadcast on traditional TV, sometimes live, sometimes taped. You called it a laboratory. What did you learn?

    A bunch of things. The first job was to try not to lose money on the Olympics. Based on the prior couple of Olympics, it looked as if we would lose money, and we were very fortunate to break even, maybe even make a small profit. That bodes well for the multibillion-dollar [$4.4 billion] decision we made to carry the Olympics through 2020.

    We had projected we'd be about 10% below Beijing because Michael Phelps won eight gold medals, and how could you top that? And the [Beijing] time zone was so far away that a lot of events were broadcast live in the U.S. Europe is the most difficult for that live factor. So we budgeted it down 10% and in fact came in up 10%. Why? Well, social media was something the NBC team embraced. We also used all our networks [NBC, CNBC, MSNBC, Telemundo, Bravo, USA, and many others], not just one. The number of hours of television was unprecedented. We put every single event live online and had mobile apps. The cable side of the company, Xfinity, had on-demand information on every American athlete on laptops, on mobile phones. We had 40 million to 50 million on-demand sessions in 17 days.

    So the public could not get enough ways to experience and touch the Olympics, and that bodes well for the future model. This company is in a position to take an event or a news happening or a movie and expose it as widely as possible in a very fragmented world, different from almost any other media or telecommunications company out there.

    Telephony is another thing you're doing in a big way. Voice is becoming essentially a wireless business, but you've sold your wireless spectrum. What's the future?