Online inauguration videos set records

/technology

February 2, 2009MIS 304 - Dr. FangCalifornia State University San MarcosJames Olas

Barack Obama’s InaugurationTuesday, January 20, 20091.5 million people attendedMany people at workWatched online LIVE video7.7 million people watched onlineCNN.com LIVE had about 1.3 million simultaneous video connections for inaugural address

Record Breaker

Many news sites broke records for streaming video from a live sourceAkai Technologies (web traffic company) believes the inauguration to be the “single most-watched event in the history of live Web video” (cnn.com)CNN.com’s record was broken on Tuesday with about 27 million people watching inauguration day coverage throughout the dayPrevious record was 5.3 million people on election day for CNN.com

Problems

Some LIVE video connections failed for certain web stiesTraffic slowed as much as 60% on top 40 internet sites when ceremony startedSome people had to wait on CNN.com to watch live, streaming video

Put into waiting room that said "You made it! However, so did everyone else."

Old Technology

Some people had to revert to older technology methods

TelevisionRadio

James M. Klatell wrote in a CBSNews.com blog entry on Tuesday "Maybe we're not as far into the Internet Age as we thought."

New Demand

Al Tompkins teaches broadcasting and online news at the Poynter Institute in Florida.He believes this shows that many consumers demand live, streaming video online and companies should offer more live video"In the past, you pretty much had to be at home or in an office with television to be able to experience what's in Washington," said Clint Cantwell

Social Networking

CNN.com and Facebook worked together to allow Facebook users to comment on the inauguration while watching itFacebook had a record 4,000 status updates per minute on Tuesday morningOnline comments reached 8,500 messages per minute during the speech

New Era of Communications

According to the Pew Research Center, most Americans got their national and international news from online instead of print in 2008Tompkins (the online news teacher) believes news web sites need to continue to advance how consumers learn about big eventsObama used internet very much for campaign

Importance of Technology

It’s the futureBusinessCommunicationsPolitics

CNN.com should have used “cloud computing”