OS+-+Defender

This page is for notes for the Open Space Sessions in Defender.

Conveners, you (or your designee) should update your wiki page with:
 * Brightcove Video Issues
 * Joshua Stewart - Trinity Christian Academy
 * Elizabeth Preston, Billy Faires, Via Varnell, Desiree, Shandor and lots of others.

Main issues with Brightcove:

- Teachers upload videos in a format that Brightcove does not support so are not even using the video upload tool. - No easy, quick way to see if videos get uploaded successfully - need to refresh the screen or go back and re-visit at a later time and many times - Poor quality when videos are uploaded. WH says it's the school's bandwidth problem but issues have been duplicated by WH staff members as well. - Not enough control over the video quality, conversion and display options - No way to know when the video is available - People need to do multiple steps when taking and uploading video - IOS devices are commonly used and there's not a direct way to upload from your camera roll right into Podium - need to upload to a computer first and then upload. - Takes too long to upload video - due to multi-bit rate issue where Brightcove has to create multiple versions of the file - Would like a way to encode the video themselves without having to work with Brightcove

WH Convo with Brightcove

- Brightcove is making updates to the algorithms they are using and have acknowledged that people have appropriate amount of bandwidth but still getting lesser quality video. WH has asked if Brightcove can display with rendition you are getting and should be able to choose a different, higher quality version. WH is still waiting on Brightcove for updates on this issue

Brightcove focuses on getting a video out for people not using the devices for the high quality viewing, which is when the quality goes down. Brightcove allows people to view videos on tablets and other mobile devices but the result is loss of quality on desktops.

Possible solutions to not having a way to know when the video is done processing and is available to use on the site- an email notification when the video gets successfully processed or if the video fails and why it failed.

May need to consider upgrading software schools are using to the most recent version (SmartNotice?) so the files may be more likely to be supported file types in Brightcove.

WH is open to looking to new vendors if customers are not finding Brightcove to be an adequate option for video uploading.

You can't remove the video name from appearing in the top left, but you can edit the title of the video - to do this, you need to edit the video category and enable the 'allow titles on videos' and then click into the album, click into batch edit and you can enter in a title in the title field.

There is interest in streaming videos - people attend school events (football games, assemblies, etc) and they shoot in HD and these support streaming video.

St. Luke's School in CT has streamed video and had great response to it.Others find it's easier to do video ahead of time and then edit and decide when it gets published.

Google is about to announce a live streaming feature - might also be a free feature.

No easy way to see how many videos have been uploaded and a quick overview of where all of the videos in the database are set to display and a way to bulk delete all videos.

Issue with file sizes - can't keep adding 1 GB files

Media Management interface is needed - a quick, easy way to see all media related content that is active (or expired) for a manager to easily sort through files from all different areas (course pages, athletic pages, public pages, portal, etc)

Currently video is not on the immediate radar to be changed with the new release of products but WH has been working with Brightcove to explain the issues.

Needs to work on an ipad, iphone, android, etc

Vimeo - downside of that is that there's no a quick way to add this into the WH sites - schools need to embed the videos into a text channel and this isn't realistic for most schools in regards to teachers and standard content editors knowing how to do that.

Video should not appear in push page because of email clients not supporting this well - should link to a video (through an image or a hyperlink).

YouTube isn't ideal because after watching videos, the 'related' videos are sometimes inappropriate - schools have gotten in trouble a few times with people who have tagged in related videos because anyone can post to YouTube and enter any tags/keywords.

Some cool ideas people have done:

One school gave flip phones to a group of people to walk around and ask random students what they are most excited about for the start of the school year. They'll gather these snippets and add them onto the site.

Junior class - 1st day of school - they did a project where they got into groups of 4 and went into the Alumni office and interviewed them and reflected on their high school years and had them talk about where they went from there. Gave a time limit of 3 mins each - played all of the video in the theater and then posted on the site. This was a great way to include the alumni community.

2 different styles of videos - a professional, polished video bank (from a professional videographer) and then 'authentic' videos that are shot from community members (students, teachers, alums, parents) and take quick candid snippets of school life.

Westminster School offers a video class (class has all equipment) and lots of students sign up for that.

St. Luke's CT does a 'flipped classroom' style where the teacher does a 10 minute video and then posts on their course page. This is a benefit of Brightcove - students can watch the physics lecture on their iphone on the way home from an athletic game or en route somewhere.

How do you take video of classrooms or other events and keep people at ease without having them have an 'un-authentic' discussion? - Time helps, allow people to adjust to the idea of getting videotaped. Maybe trip flip phones that aren't so obvious.

PANOPTO - video editing option - possible integration? Expensive option (over $5,000).


 * Discussion changed to giving schools access to CSS - there is a plan to allow people to have more control so they don't need to create their own workarounds to customize styles (such as photo borders). Would like a greater level of freedom over the