On August 8, the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games opened its grand prelude. The Olympics, as a world festival, is sometimes referred to as a 'Mega Event,' meaning a very big event of which the number of visitors is more than one million and the cost for it requires almost five hundred million dollars. Mega events include the Olympics, the FIFA World Cup, the World Championship in Athletics, and the Asian Games.

For example, 'Triple Crown' refers to a country which has an experience of holding such a mega event more than three times. South Korea is the 7th triple crown country in this sense as it held 1988 Seoul Olympics, the 2002 FIFA World Cup, and the 2002 Busan Asian Games.

Definitely, there are many positive effects caused from holding such mega events. First, the direct effect from it is economic profits. The sales of entrance tickets and the sales of televising are needless to say as for the economic profits. More specifically to state the effect of economic development through the events, in the case of the construction industry, as the events need stadiums and accommodation, the host country should invest in the field and it naturally increases the hiring rate, bringing about economic growth of the nation. Further, they can also contribute to the increase of the exporting rate from the direct and powerful advertising effect as the host nation.

Second, the events make each nation exchange and flourish the cultures they have through the direct contacts between the tourists and the residents where the events are held. Through such a positive effect, the host nation can also promote its national image from its worldwide attention during the time when the events were being held. For example, a variety of related cultural events also make related cultural products or tourism souvenirs and they can make it possible to let the nation more be widely known to the world.

Even though mega events have such positive effects, it can cause more harm than good. First, with such an economic problem such as a rapid rise of prices or real-estate speculation can make the economic situation of the nation worse. For instance, while the host country should build gymnasiums and other necessary facilities, realtors or investors may purchase most of the territory to increase the land price. Another bad side effect is the conflict between the residents and visitors and it naturally causes the difficulty of maintaining public peace. Hence, the rate of criminal occurrences also rises.

Second, when a mega event is held, the people of the nation should take care of the national image which is shown to the world. In the case of our country, we have a little bit shameful dog-eating culture and sometimes seen as the country with a high striking rate. Considering the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, as a world festival, it was generally interesting. However when we found out that most of the events in the opening ceremony were done by computer graphic effects, we were disappointed. Firecracker, a display of fireworks, and the pretty and a cute girl singing songs were all fabricated with the help of computer graphics. In the case of the cute girl, the girl was created through computer graphics and the singing sound was from another girl who sang behind the stage. Such fabrication used in such a big world event can negatively affect the image of China in the future.

In conclusion, a mega event obviously has many good effects in that it can directly bring about national economic development but the host country needs to keep careful attention to prevent possible negative side effects from it.