China's embrace of the spin machine could be seen as further evidence that it has moved further into the 21st century.

Not only were some of the fireworks for the opening ceremony computer generated, but one of the child singers was actually miming - because the girl with the singing voice wasn't deemed pretty enough to appear on the world's television screens.

Sadly, we Brits are in no position to mock, following the revelations about fakery in various television programmes. The Chinese are just doing it on an even bigger scale.

But it reinforces the idea that we shouldn't try to compete with China when our own Olympics come around in 2012.

Let's not worry so much about the glitz and just do it in our traditional under-stated manner. It may not impress the world quite as much, but it's what we're good at.