[liberationtech] Google+ Hangout-powered Global Press Conference

[Nathan of Guardian]

In my role as Director of Technology with the Tibet Action Institute, I
get to come up with crazy ideas that "Just Might Work"(tm), and
ultimately help get our message out in a more powerful way.

The first time I saw Google+ new Hangout feature, I immediately thought
about how it could be used for a discussion panel or press conference.
We had attempted something like this in the past using
LiveStream/Mogulus, but it was too complicated, had too many ads, and
didn't handle the high latency we experienced connecting people between
multiple continents.

Fortunately, Hangout seems to solve almost all of these problems, and
allowed us to, early this morning, hold our first global online video
press conference, with a handful of activists and reporters meeting
face-to-face in a hangout. We also were able to accommodate 25 more
viewers by capturing and rebroadcasting the hangout to Ustream.tv, which
also provided a recorded archive of the whole event.

All in all, it lasted about an hour, worked pretty well, and was a fun
first attempt and a big new possibility for activists groups looking to
engage with the global media in a new way. If Google can automagically
integrate Hangout with YouTube Live at some point, it would be pretty
amazing.

G+ public post with short edited video is here:
https://plus.google.com/115160700425548211663/posts/ftvgpcNv6qo

Full background is here:
https://tibetaction.net/2011/07/15/first-ever-google-hangout-powered-global-press-conference/

Best, and Happy Friday!

+nathan