Power to the People or Power to the Pixels

The mass-games style use of thousands on extras on the field in the Opening Ceremony of the Beijing 2008 Olympics caused considerable commentary about the relationship between human actors who served as pixels and the digital imagery of the spectacle, shown on the giant LED screen, which was unrolled like a traditional scroll on the field, and projected on a giant scrim overhead. In terms of visual culture, it is interesting to think about mass spectacles before the television era. How far did composite images created by fans in stadium sports predate the screens that relied on discrete dots of color to create an image?

Update: Check out what Lev Manovich has to say about the "augmented architecture" and "archbody media" here