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It was neither new media or old... it was just much closer because of the access over the Internet to all the information, video and conversations. That is a massive difference and starts to make everyone feel like they are neighbours rather than the 'other' people.

In the coworking space from which I work, where most of us are frequent users of all the shiny new toys like Twitter, u-stream, etc we chose a hybrid of old and new; the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ News output, but viewed over the internet rather than TV.

It was fun to continue watching the later coverage via u-stream on my iPhone whilst waiting for my bus in a wifi hotspot, but no substitute for old media – yet.

"I think the 1.5 billion mentioned in some places has just been pulled out of a hat"

That was exactly my thought.

I was still working until 17:30 so I sat in the sitting room with my laptop watching the plain old ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ TV coverage. I did have twitter open and did make a tweet or three (but, of course, forgot the #inaug09 hashtag).

For me, it was a multitasking mix. I was
1. watching the coverage on ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖHD
2. Participating in conversations on Twitter
3. Checking out websites and links as they came up on Twitter
4. Working (building a website)
Phew!

On the White House blog, the first post said it was Macon Phillips, the Director of New Media for the White House who was writing, but he did say that he was "one of the people contributing the the blog", not the only one.

He emphasised the importance of transparency as a rationale for their social media strategy, so perhaps we can hope that future White House blog authors will be as forthcoming about their identity?

The lack of comments is disappointing, but as with our own Number 10, the logistics of moderating conversations would be a total headache wouldn't they!

Ended up very "new media" for me. Was at work without TV access, so followed it mostly via Twitter (with occasional forays to the Guardian's live blog).

Then when I got home I watched the oath, speech etc. on iPlayer.

I'm usually a ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ viewer when it comes to major events.

But I found Skynews live HD streaming very god on my Macbook Pro. I also tried uStrem on a iPhone which worked, but got a few timeouts - probably due to the number of people using it.

Sat watching a HD broadcast from the US without any wires - how things have changed since my Z80.

I followed comments on Twitter, and watched the Hulu stream (in the UK) via Boxee. The streaming held up reasonably well, and the comments on Twitter gave a bit of a different view. Of course just watching on TV would have avoided the odd video stutter.

The Americans don't need a Presidency that uses the internet as you do, and we don't really need a Number 10 to use it either.

Media of all type has now got completely out of control

The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ used to have 2 TV stations, great local radio and important national radio. It was mostly of good quality, repeats were once only (months later) and few, and all the news sounded fresh and keenly researched and produced on time.

Now, the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ has 24 hour news, a multitude of TV channels and digital radio channels and the massive website. It has embraced new media (albeit late and very clumsily - no you were not ground breaking, your PR just said you were) to a massive extent.

It delivers poorly researched stories cycled and recycled endlessly as journalists and editors split their time trying to fill ridiculous amounts of air time. We have programmes that can be repeated anything up to 4 and 6 times within a couple of weeks of transmission, vast amounts of wisely forgotten archive material peddled out by the ton load, and masses of egocentric presenters fighting for celeb status.

The independent commercial channels have exactly the same problem.

The effect on ITV et al? Their advertising revenue is now thinned as price per spot prices fall through the floor and their costs spiral.

The effect on the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ? Poor quality programming, budget cuts, and a swamp of an offering where finding anything new is nearly impossible.

I NEVER thought I would see the day when one broadcaster would run both the new series and the old series of a programme at the same time!

But all broadcasters are doing precisely that.

The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ says it is about choice.

Poppycock! It is simply about outdoing each other. The ultimate shame being that Ofcom has actually encouraged this.

And now you want the organisations who run whole countries to waste their time and our money in the same way?

Why???

I watched the Silverlight stream on the official pic2009 site using Firefox on an XP PC on a wired LAN which has an "up to" 16Mb/s adsl connection. It worked very well, with quality comparable to an standard-res TV signal. I was very impressed.

During the event itself it was a combination of Radio 4 (I was driving) and ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ HD once I got back home.

Where the new media alternatives will come into their own is after the event. I'm itching to check the CNN photosynth for example, I just can't install the plugin at work!

I watched it from my desk at work on the dear old bbc.co.uk - excellent stream, never faltered once, though we do have a 20mb pipe here.

I blogged my way through the day here:

Good old television for me. It was nice to just enjoy it and let the announcers ferret out bits of information to spice up the slow moments. Instead of sitting there with Twitter, Wikipedia, streaming video etc. in fifty different windows!

I suspect that the Obama White House blog will - at best - be just another offshoot of the Whitehouse Press office (e.g. see links at the bottom of its page), at worst a more official looking extension of his campaign website.
He may post, just as he'll give prepared speeches and announcements, but they will be as carefully planned and orchestrated.

Gurubear wrote:

"Media of all type has now got completely out of control"

Good! Who wants it any other way.

The CNN 3D mosaic photosynth test worked out magnificently. As new photos are added it just gets better.

"But for every person who surfed, tweeted and streamed their way through 20 January 2008"

erm... aren't we in 2009?

Stayed with CNN (on cable) all evening long from 4pm (UK time) onwards. Closest thing to being there as far as I was concerned.

The only failing I experienced was the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ TV commentators in Washington talking over the music and singing and also interrupting the spoken proceedings. Really spoilt it for me, was also a point of contention amongst my small group of twitter friends simultaneously commenting on events.....

The Actual Ceremony was just that with it's own presenter and IMHO least said would have been more than enough from the usual ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ spokespersons.

I set my laptop up to record it through a TV tuner, so a mix of both.

urgh, yet another big news story, yet another ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ twitter love-in.

other (and better) services are available and should be given a chance. or does the beeb hold a stake in our electronic fethered boredom!?

I guess I'm the odd one out here. I was outside in a field patching up fences, clearing ditches and then cutting up logs, not a trace of IT or communication technology near me.

I did check the news on the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ website later that night though. Haven't had time to watch the speech but will do so sometime in the future. Don't have a television and radio reception is not good so I guess I'm new media.

Rory:
I was on the (old media) for the Inauguration because I knew that the new media was going to have problems....

~Dennis Junior~

new media, all the way.

can't stand the insufferable meat-puppet-improv, with their vacuous chatlines blotting out the live event sounds -- catching Twitter provides all the gush and gabble anyone could need, and smart insightful sites (DailyKos.com for example) provide insider detail at whatever depth is one's taste.

I was a 'no media' person.

I got that sick of the wall to wall worship of the new messiah I turned the tele off.

I went on a photography website for a while. Several people commented on the unusually high number of people logged on. Then someone else noted we were all there because we were sick of Obamamania.

I would have been interested to see some coverage of the (almost half) of Americans who did not vote for the messiah.

This was definitrely an event for the big screen, in the same way that many films lack sparkle on TV. I watched it on TV, didn't even think about using new media as they are patently inferior for this type of occasion.

However, having said that, but I'm afraid I switched channels to Sky after a while as Huw Edwards' commentary was excruciating - both pompous and banal, and cut across the event inappropriately. The guest commentators were nobodies (I suppose all the somebodies were in the official party).

All in all the worst showing by ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ news since the Olympics opening ceremony, which as I recall also involved the dreadful Mr. Edwards.

CNN was useless online - why did they use Octagon? What was wrong with some kind of traditional webstream program?

And the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ got it wrong (again) with Huw Edwards. What was wrong with Matt Frei? Or Justin Webb? Or Gavin Esler who did the job so well the last couple times?

Well, I used a mixture; a 3G card (using HSDPA) on my latop, and that's because my work is mobile. I certainly would have watched on TV if I had the chance, given the importance of the event.

I signed into the Facebook/CNN thing but initially I couldn't watch the live stream as it said the system had reached capacity. Although disappointing, that's much better than the system falling over for everyone. So well done to CNN for doing their homework on the tech, which actually doesn't take much.

It didn't take moments before I got the live stream, which was a bit shaky at the beginning; occasional freezing and all. But it soon stabilised though I wasn't sure whether to attribute it to CNN having beefed up their streaming servers or the HSDPA connection having improved.

I even opened the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's live stream simultaneously without problems! Regarding the two streams, CNN was lagging behind the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ by as much as 3 secs, though I preferred CNN because they were streaming a much bigger screen resolution.

I suppose one important thing to keep in mind is that in terms of quality, TV and new media are incomparable at the moment. However, it's other factors such as convenience, interactivity, mobility, etc that favour new media.

I mentioned above that it was not exactly convenient for me to watch the event on TV as I was out and about. But the new media enabled me to experience it while on the move and I shared the moment with so many friends in real time! TV can't do that, yet. Yahoo and others are working on it, though.

Aretha Franklin's performance was NOT electrifying. She took a perfectly acceptable piece of music and murdered it. Why do these stars have to seek glory at the wrong time? Her rendition was more fitted to a blues bar on Beale Street!

I have to agree with fspeirs and I am a big fan of the Queen of Soul as she murdered a good song. It was paining my ears to listen to her caterwauling. She was goddamn awful I don't think she was seeking glory I just think that her voice has gone time and she should retire. I'd have gone with Latoya London or a jazz singers such as Dianne Reeves, Nenna Freelon, Deborah Cox not that well know but great voices however would the crowd and the event have fazed them mmm not sure but they'd have sounded better than Aretha.

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