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« on: March 31, 2012, 10:46:35 AM »
This response if for the collegiate program I run at NYU. we do not stream the Intangible Slam. For whatever reasons many locations in nyc, ours included, have funny rules about video, notably streaming.
-How often do you live stream at your slam?
We stream most of our on campus slams, if not all.
-If you do, to what purpose? Publicity? Fundraising? Document-archive?
In the future we would love this to provide a fundraising component. For now, its more just for out of towners, and friends of ours in the collegiate natiional scene to peek in on our events. We also dont tend to announce the stream through our team FB until a few hours before the shows, so as not to dissuade kids from not actually attending as opposed to watching in their rooms.
-If you charge to view, what do you charge?
we dont as of yet, but i see that as a part of our future
-What system do you use? Ustream or some other?
we do use ustream, yes.
-What camera or equipment do you use? (I-phone, the mic and camera on a laptop, etc)
we just set up a laptop on a front row chair facing the mic.
-Does your equipment come from your slam's budget or is the use of it donated?
being a team funded by an exorbinantly wealthy university, we could probably ratchet up the technology a bit. that being said, the technology we use now suits the needs of our audience fine. (my laptop, the internet)
-How much money do you budget to do this or is it donated?
zero.
-Are your quality expectations low or high (HD, someone's laptop, doesn't matter, it's the content that counts)?
again, in the future we'd love to take this to the next step and have better quality streams, but it appears that a good amount of people will watch regardless. we average 40-60 per stream.
-What challenges, problems, solutions did you find in doing this; your trials, errors, and fixes?
Again ours is a very simple set-up, the only hitch in the plan is aiming the laptop perfectly so it doesnt stream peoples knee-caps for two hours.
additional thoughts:
I could be wrong, but im pretty sure the absolute height of regular slam streaming technology is NYC-Urbana. Its a super-good quality, its done weekly, and back when i was involved in the managing the series, the slam averaged about 200 views every week (more than there ever is in the actual room at the BPC). The urbana series is the most technologically advanced slam ive seen (in-line phone patch so Mali can call the stage from Qatar or wherever he is). I highly advise anyone inquiring about streaming to get in touch with the folks on the Urbana Committee.
Also, Aaron Samuels of WU Slam has a pretty slick and consistent streaming operation. He's been streaming his college's preliminary bouts at CUPSi since way before i thought that technology existed.