Webcasting Brings Mixed Results

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, Sept, 2000

Some view Internet Webcasting as a medium that will take off in the future and a good way to extend the value of editorial content. "I think it's inevitable in some form," says Bob Metcalfe, IDG's technology pundit. "It's a question of surfing some technology waves." Metcalfe's own 15-week "experiment" with Webcasting, his Live from the Ether "show," brought mixed results in the spring.

The audience and sponsors were there, but the technology needed a little refining. Metcalfe appeared weekly on Itworld.com with a Web extension of his Internet print column. On video he would discuss his print column, entertain e-mail questions, and end with a closing commentary. Compaq sponsored the show with two ads per episode, and the regular audience numbered in the 100 to 300 range. "Can we attract an audience?" he asks. "The answer appears to be 'yes,' but it's a highly qualified audience, not a general audience." Sometimes the show was Webcast on remote from Metcalfe's home in Maine or from Laguna Niguel, California. H owever, there are still bugs to work out. "Windows Media Player didn't work very well, and only Windows people could watch," he says. "The audio was good, but the streaming is marginal. It's not high-quality video, not high resolution." Not yet, anyway.