inauguration streams review

Tue Jan 20 19:24:49 UTC 2009

Normally I wouldn't do this but given that it's of-the-moment...

fh

-------------------------

http://www.salon.com/tech/giga_om/online_video/2009/01/20/a_quick_review_of_obamas_inauguration_streams/

Tuesday, January 20, 2009 08:02 PST
A Quick Review of Obama’s Inauguration Streams
By Chris Albrecht

You may have heard, but Barack Obama gets to ditch the “-elect” part of his title today as he will be sworn in (shortly) as 
our new President. We’ve already provided an comprehensive list of where to watch the inauguration online, but here’s 
a quick review of what to expect from some of them, so far.

C-Span’s coverage is not very impressive. The video window was small, and choppy. Avoid.

CBS is offering 7 HD streams of the event, and they look awesome. Definitely the best of the lot — worth watching.

MSNBC, FOX (which is providing Hulu’s feed) and ABC News’s video is solid, nothing too flashy. They all work just fine 
(and I love that MSNBC allows embeds).

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

I had problems with CNN. It was the only network that asked me to install an update to Flash as well as another plug-in. 
I skipped the second plug-in and it worked fine. The video’s in widescreen, which is nice, and the Facebook 
integration gives you a running commentary.

The Presidential Inauguration Committee’s stream is pretty dull, offering just imagery and no commentary.

If our internal stats are any indication, this is going to be a huge day for live-streaming, and it looks like for the most part, 
every network involved is holding up and the Internet won’t crash (of course, we still have an hour to go).