Inaugural webcasts praised and panned

23.01.2009
Online video performance on Inaugural Day drew mixed reviews. Judging from the online feedback, some people enjoyed watching Obama's swearing-in ceremony and speech over the Web. However, because of jerky or frozen video, missing audio or other problems, many wished they could have watched it on a more reliable medium, such as television.

Mary Stevens, a cofounder of the online event guide Lyve Gyde, party-hopped several webcasts, and was impressed overall. "Generally, the webcasts from various sources worked pretty well for me," she said in an e-mail interview. "While I was watching... I did not experience major problems with screens freezing or coverage stopping."

TechCrunch commenter Todd Mitchell praised Fox's Hulu-based live broadcast. "Although in partnership with Fox News, [it] has been by far the best available stream," he said. "No skipping, no buffering, solid definition and audio is clear."

Marguerite Floyd, a hospital documentation manager, felt lucky to be able to watch the event at work on her computer via the CNN Live/Facebook Webcast. "Reception was wonderful!" she said in an e-mail interview with The Industry Standard. "Wonderful close-ups of the president and his wife; I even suspected I saw tears in his eyes as he gave his speech. There were maybe three times I got static for a few seconds, but I think that was the cameras being shifted. Of course, during the swearing-in and Obama's speech there was only silence on my Facebook connection. And, I suspect, throughout the world."

But more typical was the disappointing experience of Mskidz, posting at the Washingtonpost.com. "I tried to watch the swearing-in at my desk, but the live-streaming didn't go so well," the comment said. "I first tried Washington Post's stream, very choppy. CNN immediately put me on a 'wait list' so I went to MSNBC. Not quite as choppy, but then during the speech it slowed down even more. Then it started jumping ahead trying to catch up, causing me to miss most of the speech."

TechCrunch commenter Deano tried to watch CNN Live, which featured a live streaming Webcast with Facebook comments on the right half of the screen. However, he found the event, which drew 13.9 million live streams, unsatisfactory: "the CNN/Facebook stream was 'full, sorry' when I got there. Tubes were clogged at every site, streaming speed was miserable and jerky, our 5Mb up/down was like a dread ghost town of wanting - and not getting - inaugural goodness."