World of Webcast

Last summer at InfoComm 2009 in Orlando, we were delighted to be a part of the informal awards ceremony for the 2^nd Annual PROAV Spotlight Awards.

The editors of PRO AV and ARCHITECT, in partnership with InfoComm International, created the program to recognize the industry’s best professional audiovisual installations.

Acentech, one of our AV partners, received the 2009 PRO AV Spotlight Award for Best Education AV Project, which included the integration of the Mediasite lecture capture platform into Alter Hall at Temple University’s Fox School of Business.

Here’s a quick 2-minute interview with both Brad Grimes, editor of PRO AV, and Larry Philbrick, supervisory consultant at Acentech.

“Alter Hall exemplifies cutting edge smart technology for higher education, giving students access to advanced educational technology and new learning tools. Acentech is proud to have been a part of the integrated design team. We are honored to be recognized with the PRO AV Spotlight award alongside the Fox School of Business, as well as Sonic Foundry, the leaders in lecture capture.”

Larry Philbrick
Supervisory Consultant, Acentech

And here’s more info about lecture capture at Fox School of Business, PRO AV’s write up “Blueprint for University AV” featuring Temple’s Alter Hall, and a list of all 15 of the 2009 winners. “They employ the latest AV technology, be it HD-SDI video distribution or capacitive touch navigation. They’re the result of successful coordination among AV integrator, consultant, architect, end user, and other parties. And they demonstrably enhance the lives, businesses, education, spirituality, and enjoyment of the winners’ clients and their clients’ clients,” wrote PRO AV Editor Brad Grimes. Hear hear.

The call for entries for the 2010 PRO AV Spotlight Awards is now open - entry deadline is March 1, 2010 and you can apply online (and note the same is true for our very own Rich Media Impact Awards, due the same day - if you dig the PRO AV awards you might be right for our Facility Design category).

As Mediasite continues to evolve, it can be hard to keep up with all the things Mediasite can do for you to make your life easier. I stumbled onto one such example in a conversation with a customer, who was delighted to learn of it. What is it? It has to do with the ability to link player graphics.

In our Mediasite Players, you can link player graphics to the URL of your choice. So, if you want to link the banner graphic to a URL, you can do that. If you want to link the “This presentation has ended” graphic to a URL, you can. In fact, you can replace default graphics with your own graphics. You might change that “presentation has ended” graphic to read, “Thanks for watching! Click on this slide to help us improve by answering a brief, two-minute survey” Or you might send them to take a test in your LMS.

I thought a short conversation with Shane Tracy, our Director of Training and Events, would help you understand this feature better, as well as the steps to follow. See the brief, two-minute presentation below.

Note: The Silverlight player treats some of the graphics differently, so not all graphics are as linkable as those in the Classic Mediasite Player.

Finally, if you are on an earlier version of Mediasite (e.g., still on 4.3) and looking for other features or reasons to upgrade, check out our upcoming webcast this Friday called, Upgrading from Mediasite 4.x to 5.3: Why Make the Move Now?

Hope you can make it!

Russell Beard, Director of Information and Communication Services at Big Bend Community College, will present on this topic Tuesday, January 26 at 11:00 a.m. Central. Like all our webinars, it is free. Just register before we go live.

How is one of the smallest community colleges in the state of Washington with one of the largest service districts - 4,000 students across 4,500 square miles - finding the money, time and political will to launch new programs at a time like this?

Russell Beard of Big Bend Community College will show you how.

After twelve years investing deeply in videoconferencing, the college found it was still a struggle to maintain a stable environment over the course of an 11 week quarter. They’d lose a connection, a mic would go out or they weren’t able to capture the visual aids from multiple devices.

Then when the economic crisis hit, they had to take a hard look at their education technology infrastructure, soon realizing they were spending a 6-figure sum to generate maybe 6 FTE credits.

That’s when they decided to move entirely to webcasting via Mediasite.

Beard will present how Big Bend Community College:

• Launched new programs in the face of budget cuts through executive buy in and grant writing
• Moved from having to beg, borrow and threaten faculty to use their technology-enabled classrooms to having a line of faculty waiting to get in
• Determined webcasting with Mediasite to be the most cost effective approach for reaching every one of their constituents with a decent internet connection
• Created best of breed hybrid class offerings with virtual classrooms, lectures and office hours both synchronous and asynchronous
• Leverages Mediasite for creative uses outside of lecture capture in the classroom, including Small Business Administration courses, board of trustee meetings and their State of the College address

About the presenter
Russell Beard is the Director of Information and Communication Services at Big Bend Community College (BBCC). He has served in this capacity at the college for over nine years. BBCC has worked to be an innovator in distant education for over twenty years having one of the largest service districts in the state of Washington. Russell has served on numerous state commissions and councils providing a vision for technology and its use in the classroom not only for BBCC but for all of the Community and Technical Colleges in the state.

Don’t miss out on the opportunity for the live Q&A - register now.

Two speakers from Memphis City Schools - Jeff Baxter, Department of Communications, and Scott Holcomb, Department of Instructional Technology - will present “5 Reasons K-12 Desperately Needs Webcasts, Webinars and On-Demand Video” tomorrow, January 26, at 9:30 a.m. Central. As always, it’s free. Just register before we go live.

• “We will never be able to afford that kind of technology.”
• “Who’s going to learn to run this technology?”
• “How do we get started?”
• “People need to get into the same room together for them to really understand this info.”
• “We can just get on the phone and send the PPT around.”
• “Once they get my presentation in a webcast, I’ll be replaced.”
• “Right now we have to find new ways to bring in revenue from outside the district.”

Sound familiar? Memphis City Schools thought so. But that didn’t stop them from getting the buy-in to start doing webcasts, webinars and on-demand online video. In just 4 years, they’ve recorded over 500 videos for their district alone. And it all revolved around three simple letters- ROI.

Find out why the 23rd largest K-12 school system in the US is using technology that has traditionally been in the hands of corporate America and higher ed institutions, and learn how you can use webinars to drive professional development, communication and instruction for your school district.

Our presenters will be on a mission to convince you:

• There are ways to get the green light to buy high-quality technology right now
• Teachers can absolutely run this technology, and it doesn’t require a huge infrastructure of people, time or money to maintain
• Creating your own webcasts and webinars is more effective than the way you are doing professional development and district communications right now
• The same tools you use for your continuing education should be good enough for our district’s students and teachers
• While it is tempting to think you could do this on your own with a video camera, there are important keys to success you’ll miss
• Accountability and flexibility - there is an ROI in this mix!

About the presenters
We’re just teachers (but really cool ones!).

Jeff Baxter, Department of Communications, Memphis City Schools
As a Special Projects Coordinator, Jeff works on the district’s website and administers the Mediasite webcasting platform throughout the District. Jeff received his B.S. from the University of Memphis in Human Learning and Development and has worked as a classroom teacher, instructional facilitator, technology coordinator and technology specialist.

Scott Holcomb, Department of Instructional Technology, Memphis City Schools
In 1998 Scott began his teaching career as an elementary school teacher and school based Technology Coordinator for students in Memphis City Schools. Taking time off from the traditional classroom in 2004, he joined a small group of nerdy and dedicated teachers who made up the Instructional Technology Department for the district, serving as an Instructional Technology Specialist. He works hands on with fellow educators in better integrating technology into the classroom as well as pushing open the envelope of instructional technology via Mediasite at the district level. Scott has a Master’s in Education from Auburn University as well as just having obtained his administrative license in the state of Tennessee. http://www.edtechteachers.com/

Here’s the link again to register.

Philip G. Forte, President of Blue Sky Broadcast, will present “What Every Association Should Know About Online Education - Before You Do Your First Webcast” tomorrow, January 26, at 1:00 p.m. As always, this webinar is free. Simply register before the event.

Feel like you should be doing more online education but not sure how to fit it into your existing day to day?

You aren’t alone.

Budget and time constraints have made it harder for members to travel for continuing education and professional development, while digital venues have grown exponentially. From listservs to forums to social media - people have never had more opportunities to learn from each other online.

Yet, many associations continue to wrestle with how to create their own online education initiative: How do we integrate it into our plan? How do we price it if we do? How do we deliver CEUs online?

In this webinar, Phil will share his roadmap, including case studies, for how to introduce online learning - like live webcasts and on-demand webinars - into your membership offering.

He’s worked with over 200 nonprofit associations whose primary mission is member education, helping them navigate:

• How to deliver more membership value with webcasting, from taking live meetings to a broader audience to populating your education portal with live and on-demand webcasts
• Where online education fits in your mission on the spectrum of public information to revenue generation
• What are the most common business models, and what types of presentations make for the best online learning content
• When to move from just offering on-demand presentations to streaming live
• Why some online education initiatives become lasting endeavors and others fail

Here’s that registration link again.

Live webcast of the Doomsday Clock announcement in New York

Last week, for the first time ever, people around the world were able to tune in live to watch the announcement by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists as they made a change to the Doomsday Clock.

Created in 1947, the clock has become an universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to catastrophe from nuclear weapons, climate change and emerging technologies in the life sciences. This event was the first time the clock has moved since 2007.

Sonic Foundry Event Services was onsite in New York to webcast the announcement to nearly 6,000 live viewers. The panel took questions from reporters in the room and people watching at home via the Mediasite Player and Twitter.

In the last week alone, an additional 6,000 people have tuned in to watch the on-demand webcast.

You can see the announcement and the Climate and Nuclear Security panel discussions here: http://www.turnbacktheclock.org/.

A story on NPR this morning, “Lost King Speech To Be Heard After 50 Years” got me thinking: you may never know just how valuable the presentations you capture will become.

Back in January 1960, Bethel College in Newton, Kansas played host to Martin Luther King Jr. In preparing for the 50th anniversary celebration of that speech, college officials realized they didn’t have a copy. No transcript. No audio. Nada.

They put out an email to the school’s alumni asking if anyone had a copy, and a retired engineer named Randy Harmison came to the rescue. He’d recorded the audio of several events at Bethel, but this one no one else had thought of recording it. He plugged into the public address system on a whim, “not for documentation, just to have as a keepsake,” he told NPR.

NPR also interviewed a professor at Bethel who remembered listening to the speech. He recalled how King kept repeating “we need to be maladjusted to our society, we can’t accept the status quo.” That’s a powerful theme when repeated today by an onlooker who was there back in 1960. But even more powerful this morning as the professor recalled the theme, and then NPR could play back King’s exact words (you can hear the story, including excerpts from King’s speech, here on NPR’s site around minute 2:45 in the audio).

It’s a great lesson for us who are in the business of webcasting. Each day across the globe, Mediasite could be capturing a presentation that may change the world. Guest speakers, classroom lectures, company meetings. You never know when something someone says is going to take on monumental significance. There’s no way to tell whether scholars fifty years from now will want to refer back to a speech as an important historical record.

My takeaway: never, never hesitate to hit the record button on that Mediasite Recorder. Future generations may thank you.

Seems to be Speaker and Award Submission Season. Here are a few on our radar that you might be interested, as well as our very own call for proposals and award nominations:

• Annual Conference on Distance Teaching and Learning speaking proposals due January 20. Conference is August 4-6 in Madison, Wisconsin.
• Streaming Media East call for speakers ends January 25. Conference is May 11-12 at the New York Hilton.
• EDUCAUSE 2010 call for presentations due January 26. Conference is October 13–15 in Anaheim, California.
• Annual Emerging Technologies for Online Learning (ET4Online) Symposium (Joint Symposium of Sloan Consortium and MERLOT with MoodleMoot) call for proposals extended to February 1. Symposium is July 20-23 in San Jose, CA.
• EDUCAUSE Leadership Awards call for nominations due February 10.
• 2010 PRO AV Spotlight Awards call for nominations due March 1.
• Learning Space Repository Pilot open call for examples of innovative learning spaces.
• 2010 Streaming Media Industry Sourcebook call for case studies is now open.

and two of our very own for UNLEASH 2010, the Mediasite User Conference, April 12-14 in Madison, Wisconsin:

• UNLEASH 2010 call for speakers closes February 1. Accepted speakers will get one free registration to our fourth annual Mediasite User Conference.
• Sonic Foundry’s 6th Annual Rich Media Impact Awards call for nominations close March 1. And new this year - each finalist will also receive one free registration to UNLEASH. Here’s a 3-minute on-demand presentation on why apply.

Did we miss something? Let us know here or tweet @mediasite and we’ll help get the word out.

You know how it is. You start a blog one year. You start off year two with your most popular posts from the previous year. Can’t be avoided. Simply has to be done. Might even be a law somewhere.

Who are we to argue?

We started the World of Webcast blog in March last year and 70 posts later, we’re seeing some trends. Here’s what you dug in 2009, plus why we think you dug it.

1. 4 Tips for Writing Presentation Titles that Attract Eyeballs

Face it. If you do webcasts – whether you are presenting or planning or shooting or scheduling – you are hoping someone tunes in. And this little ditty can help.

2. UNLEASH 2009: Energizing Mediasite Users On-site and Online

Bit of a surprise to see this one in the number 2 slot as it was our nomination for a Forrester Groundswell Award, but then again, we’re guessing it became popular because we actually won (yay!),  and we gave away our playbook for free in a December webinar: “Using Webcasting and Social Media to Increase Attendance, Followers and Fans: An UNLEASH09 Case Study.”

3. Mediasite 5.2 Is Here – And It’s Ahead of Schedule

What? Something ahead of schedule? That’s news. And so was the Recorder Control Center. Plus, who doesn’t love a little face time with Director of Engineering Dharmesh Sampat.

4. Read for the Record: Devour “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” with Matt Lauer, Arizona Governor Brewer and Mediasite

It’s all about the caterpillar. Or the celebrities. Either way, it’s hard to watch/read without smiling.

5. Making Multimedia Better for the Visually Impaired - An Interview with Orville Maxon

Besides great advice on the (often incorrect) assumptions many make about people with disabilities, Maxon and Pollard go back to basics with what makes a good PowerPoint and why most PPTs are worthless.

6. See You at InfoComm and EduComm (and Sloan C and Moodle Moot) Next Week?

Combined, these four events attracted ~32,000 people (with InfoComm being the obvious elephant in the room, it’s the biggest AV show event in the world). A few of them were bound to check out what we had in store.

7. OfficeMax Launches Product via a) Webcast b) Blogcast c) Mediasite d) All of the Above

Twitter played a role in the popularity of this post. If you haven’t noticed yet, the 18 million people on Twitter love to talk to each other about why Twitter rocks. That and marketers love bite-sized case studies with stealable ideas and OfficeMax served up a buffet of marketing goodness by webcasting their product launch with Sonic Foundry Event Services, with the results to prove it.

8. Mediasite, Wharton and Courses about the Financial Crisis

Wharton’s name alone inspires many business people to click. But when you combine Wharton + online courses + financial crisis, that equals timely reading for 2009.

9. A Different Kind of Online Education: the UC Merced Commencement and Michelle Obama Keynote

The Obama’s sweep the nation with a flurry of graduation speeches and the First Lady chooses Merced’s first full graduating class to receive her very first address. Mediasite was there.

10. Smart Classrooms Make A Difference in Trying Times

Be it interruption from H1N1 or financial gaps, 2009 was a banner year for “academic continuity planning” and educational technology had a seat at the table.

So that’s the year in review. But don’t leave us guessing on why these hit home. Leave a comment and let us know if we missed your favorite. Or what you’d like to see in 2010.

The new year is upon us and with it, a new release: Mediasite 5.3 (you can download it now from the Customer Assurance Portal - log in is required). As I was sharing the news on the Mediasite social scene (Facebook | LinkedIn | Twitter), a MUG member asked, “Why would I want to upgrade? WIIFM.”

Excellent question.

Here’s our very own John Pollard to talk you through the good stuff. While 5.3 isn’t intended to move mountains, for a lot of Mediasite users, it makes the first week of 2010 a reason to celebrate.

• Ability to download presentations from within the Mediasite Catalog
• Lots of player enhancements: video placement now on either side, customizable banner sizes, keyboard shortcuts, playback controls now stay visible, show or hide the reflection as you see fit, links icon now available from the control bar (instead of within the infocard)
• Bookmarking: pick up watching a presentation where you left off
• Drag and drop folders and presentations within the Management Portal or a catalog
• More reporting goodness, including printable/exportable live viewing snapshots, new folder filter in authoring stats to see who is creating what, plus multicast reporting for individual users