The Future of FIRST Competition Video Streaming

[JohnFogarty]

I think I'll just leave this here...

http://www.engadget.com/2013/08/04/y...with-100-subs/

What do you think?

[Joe G.]

IRI was done this way. The stream got taken down due to copyrighted music.

[JohnFogarty]

I had no idea that they were that bad about the music in the streaming department....considering the millions of videos on YouTube with songs from artists and I'm sure the artists don't want their music there.

[connor.worley]

Originally Posted by JohnFogarty

I had no idea that they were that bad about the music in the streaming department....considering the millions of videos on YouTube with songs from artists and I'm sure the artists don't want their music there.

The identification system catches a lot of it and applies ads / region blocking / etc. Twitch.tv is still a good streaming platform imo. One upfront ad and then no more.

[Nathan4567a]

What's with the minimum of 100 subscribers? I don't like that part. I think I'll stick with twitch tv

[PVCpirate]

Originally Posted by Nathan4567a

What's with the minimum of 100 subscribers? I don't like that part. I think I'll stick with twitch tv

If they let just anyone do it I'm not sure they'd have the bandwidth for all of it. (Disclaimer: bandwidth may not be the correct term)

[dag0620]

When I first heard about this, I got really excited that we might finally see a solution to the FIRST webcast issues we've been facing.

However looking at some of the specs right now, I don't think we've found the ultimate solution. I think Ustream will still leading the pack for the next couple seasons, even with all of it's flaws. Also keep in mind the stream qualities would often not improve on YouTube as typically the limiting factor on these streams is the bandwidth of internet at the event venue, not Ustream's servers.

Needless to say, it will be interesting to see whether my predictions are right, and where competition webcasts go. I feel we're definitely on the verge of seeing some major changes in this area soon, it's just a question of what those changes will be, and what the FIRST community comes up with.

[coalhot]

After using webcasts a lot more this year, I have to say that the preferred streaming system (at least for me) is TwitchTv. As was mentioned above, there's only one ad that you have to watch at the beginning of the stream, and it seems to interface much more nicely into the TBA Gameday setup (that may just be me though).

[dna1990]

More about content than technique, but I hope more streams stay live during match resets.

Sure, I know some of the FIRST ads are important, but they get very repetitive. And while I suppose many polished 'sports' broadcasts break away during timeouts and such - for me, watching the field be scored, or the next teams come in and set - are something I like to see (and hear).

[Steven Donow]

Originally Posted by connor.worley

The identification system catches a lot of it and applies ads / region blocking / etc. Twitch.tv is still a good streaming platform imo. One upfront ad and then no more.

I don't see why Twitch isn't used more often for FRC webcasts...it's basically the standard for eSports and I've never had a problem with it...it also has a decent mobile app for streaming.

[Steven Donow]

Originally Posted by dna1990

More about content than technique, but I hope more streams stay live during match resets.

Sure, I know some of the FIRST ads are important, but they get very repetitive. And while I suppose many polished 'sports' broadcasts break away during timeouts and such - for me, watching the field be scored, or the next teams come in and set - are something I like to see (and hear).

The reason why the FIRST ads are shown is because 99% of the time, the webcast is what's being shown on the main screen of the event at the venue, which is always showing ads/sponsor recognition(during FIRST events I wouldn't call them ads...) between matches.

[JohnFogarty]

Originally Posted by DevenStonow

I don't see why Twitch isn't used more often for FRC webcasts...it's basically the standard for eSports and I've never had a problem with it...it also has a decent mobile app for streaming.

As does UStream...I've actually never seen as Twitch.TV webstream approach the quality of the Canadian UStream events that I watched this past season.

[bduddy]

I think that using Twitch.tv more would be a great idea, if only to target the demographic of people that are already watching video game streams and might be interested in FIRST...

[BigJ]

Twitch was more focused towards video games in the beginning, but has been opened up into more live events like Magic: the Gathering (card game) tournaments and charity marathons that are based more on the live portion than the video games.

A competition like FIRST might be something really cool in Twitch's eyes. They might even be up for some front-paging or newsletter promotion if a bunch of the live-streamers that use Twitch got together and talked to them about it.

[coalhot]

Originally Posted by JohnFogarty

As does UStream...I've actually never seen as Twitch.TV webstream approach the quality of the Canadian UStream events that I watched this past season.

I doubt the stream quality has to do with the service you're using. I've watched plenty of Starcraft 2 tournaments on Twitch at full HD. I have a feeling it's just that the Canadian webcasters have better hardware and better internet connections at the events.