Photo by Kelly Samardak: An Online Minute... Burgeoning Women's Networking Event Flings It For Spring At Armani/Ristorante

The most recent Digital Diva shin-dig inspired me, a little vino and a lot of chit-chat about social experiments and live streaming… all good stuff.

The ladies in the fabulous picture to the left, and I, were discussing live webcasting and what makes a live experience more compelling than just watching an on-demand web video?  Perhaps, we get a sense of intimacy that we share with the other viewers – when you know you are not alone in the “room” so to speak…  it is an intimate feeling, with the audience and the speaker, augmented by a sense of being there.  It makes the “viewer” more of a participant than a passive set of eyeballs.  Take that and top it off with some real-time interactivity and you have a fabulous recipe for attracting a real audience.

The best live webcast experience I ever had was at the launch of “Progressive Networks” first live

streaming media experiments (a.k.a. Real Networks).

I guess it was 1996 and I can remember the haunting feeling as I listened to the audio streaming live, it would slow down and warp as I watched the “counter” go up on the webpage as people tuned in and down as people were dropped, folks from all over the world tuned in and shared in this sense of wonder.  They could be anywhere….  I was somewhere.  Who was listening in with me?

That was the very moment when I felt it in my gut, that somehow I was going to be a part of this thing… this magical thing we call streaming media.

Of course now a days we expect and need a lot more to go with the live experience, warped audio ain’t enough to let us know we are not alone in the “room”.  Now, we need to share thoughts and reactions, have the speakers respond to our concerns in real time and to top it off, we want our snarky comments to twitter and retweet to the global cesspool.

That is all well and good, but the real challenge is finding all that is live broadcasting in one place.  I am considering creating a “what’s live now” Media Portal that only announces live webcasts (live online video broadcasts) from all over the world – I could suck in feeds from Ustream, Livestream and the FCC.. and even The YouTube and Hulu.

It’s the vision I have for 2011 and I’d like your feedback on this effort and of course any developers interested in this project are welcome to join in the conversation.

I will be in and out of the Streaming Media East 2010 conference, I will have my Zoom recorder and may take some interviews to post to my new blog, by the way…

Do you like it?  Getting better, isn’t it?

I am not a total idiot, but I thought the L3 logo advertised on the site was actually level 3 – turns out that L3 is a former Boeing off-ramp that was sold off to 3 guys whose names actually began with the letter “L”.

L3 Communications is a major manufacturer of what seem to be signal amplifiers for satellite transmission.

At least when I told the sales engineer what CATV actually stands for, he laughed because he had made the same assumption I had – see my Learn something new every day post

Well, the Google algorithm makes the same assumption based on search results displayed in the following screenshot – L3 and Level 3 are not even close to related contextually.

Google Search for

Product & Service reviews from SATCON 2008

Included in this post are some of the exhibitors I intend to visit, time permitting. I am sure I will stumble on other exhbitors not on this list that may or may not impress me.

Leave a comment if you have any requests or recommendations.

Exhibitors list:

Hughes

www.hughes.com

Hughes Network Systems, LLC (Hughes) (NASDAQ:HUGH) is the global leader in providing broadband satellite products, networks, and services for enterprises, governments, small business, and consumers. Applications include managed network services, managed digital signage, multicast/broadcast content delivery, and interactive distance learning, as well as a complete range of portable and mobile SATCOM devices.

HDTV Media Group

www.hdtvmediagroup.com

<!–**** Booths are HIDDEN

****–>

HDTV media group Network Teleports provide companies with full time, domestic and international Transmission markets, while retaining the key HDTV Network benefits that are so crucial in today’s Competitive Economic Environment services and performs more than One Hundred and twenty thousand uplinks for our clients around the world. Over 100 HD channels running 24/7, our teleports deliver High Definition MPEG2-4 compression allowing the highest quality signal transmission at any bit-rate for more than 250 clients. HDTV Media Group Network offers universal connectivity over Satellite & Fiber Europe, Asia, North America and Africa, Broadcasts Video Voice over IP & Data.

L-3 Communications

www.l-3com.com

<!–**** Booths are HIDDEN

****–>

Headquartered in New York City, L-3 Communications is a leading merchant supplier of Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) products, secure communications systems and products, avionics and ocean products, training products, microwave components and telemetry, instrumentation, space and wireless products. Its customers include the Department of Defense, selected US government intelligence agencies, aerospace prime contractors and commercial telecommunications and wireless customers.

Logic Innovations

www.logici.com

<!–**** Booths are HIDDEN

****–>

Logic Innovations is a leading provider of equipment for digital broadcast and content distribution. Our products include DVB transmission equipment such as IP Encapsulators and Multiplexors, as well as receiver routers and content servers.

Rhozet

www.rhozet.com

<!–**** Booths are HIDDEN

****–>

Rhozet’s products provide cost-effective and rapid transcoding across a wide range of applications from small studios to the largest enterprises. Carbon Coder is a stand-alone application that handles transcoding between all major formats. Carbon Server is a management tool that manages a network of Carbon Coder engines to accelerate transcoding for high-volume applications.

T-VIPS America Inc.

www.t-vips.com

<!–**** Booths are HIDDEN

****–>

T-VIPS is a leading technology company specializing in Intelligent Transport Solutions. We’re offering smart products for broadcasters, telcos, network operators and MSOs who’s transmitting live television signals in contribution and primary distribution networks. T-VIPS products are purpose designed for low latency realtime broadcast quality transmissions, such as backhaul, contribution, studio-to-studio exchange and viewing, campus distribution, routing, post production and live event sports and news coverage.

Tremor Media

www.tremormedia.com

<!–**** Booths are HIDDEN

****–>

Tremor Media is the leading online video advertising with in-banner and in-stream video advertising opportunities on over 1,000 publisher sites with more than 104 million unique visitors per month. Tremor also offers the Acudeo Video Monetization Platform, enabling publishers to monetize streaming video and maximize ROI on their video content.. For more information visit: http://www.tremormedia.com

..And others….