Malibu Webcast

[Phil]

Very disappointed that having had the web cast on all Friday and most of Saturday it comes down to the Womens Final we lose the web cast, then get it back for a few, then lose it again after Nate beat Aaron and went on to 41, did he try 43?? we dont know, then we did not have any idea what Rossi did!! Nate and Will go for the title and we still do not get to see it!! even the tweets were as slow as molasses in January, so frustrating, the whole web cast thing sucks, it would be better not knowing till tomorrow, than being held in the suspense of no mans land, i really feel for the parents and relatives that are thousands of miles away trying to watch their sons and daughters compete in this prestigious event,only to be let down at the most important moment. I will most likely drawa lot of flack for airing my views on this but i am actually very angry about the whole situation!!

[thager]

I had no problem here in MN. Watched the whole thing beginning to end.

[Horton]

Whatever the issue it was done on a shoe string budget.

[gregy]

@phil I just got on the website and watch it, not sure how long in will be up. Nate looked like he could have turned 2 and made a go at 3 (@43).

[DanE]

Had no issues, the webcast worked Perfect.

Can't be a problem at the broadcastIng End if it Works for some, can it?

[skibug]

I am not complaining because it was free and I know it is done with very little budget; but, it did go out for me too right after Nate ran his 41 against Larkin. I have Windstream (DSL) as a provider and live in NC.

[Zman]

It was awesome for all the reasons well stated on the other related thread. What time do things get fired up today?

[tbrenchley]

I just watched the webcast myself and there was no way Nate was going to be able to turn that 2 ball...I don't care if he was behind a Natique, it wasn't happening. He was way to slow around 1 ball and pulled all the way to two. IMHO

[klindy]

@Zman there is no "today". The Malibu Open is Friday/Saturday tournament.

[Zman]

Oh crap....had other things going on later yesterday....hope I don't get a panda for that

[Horton]

@Zman

I thought about it.

[Zman]

Thank you kind sir....

BTW - finally put my wing back at using 7 degrees to start. Seemed to help me make a lil better turns and be a lil more consistent at 32. Don't feel like I lost any speed. Glad I spent a lot of time trying it though

[bigtallweed]

Thanks to the people that made this web cast happen.With very little waterski coverage it is great they make the effort. Being able to watch archived coverage is a big plus as most of us can not sit and watch real time. How can you complain when it is free. Keep it coming!

[skihard]

Have to agree with ski coverage being what it is today I very much enjoyed watching what I was able to see?

 

[teammalibu]

If you had any idea how hard Kelvin and his crew worked to make this happen you would be so happy to watch what you got! This was not ESPN!

Thanks Kelvin!!

[Horton]

@Phil

I hear your frustration. By some accounts it sounds like the problem was local but that is really beside the point. Our sport is in a very unfortunate stage. It is hard to be a fan. It is hard to be a family member across the globe.

 

We have webcasts that are notoriously undependable. To make the webcasts more dependable is expensive. The harsh reality is that not enough skiers watch to justify the additional cost. The Diablo webcast is one of the best every year because there is a hard line to the internet. I have to assume (yes I know that is dangerous) that there is no internet cable at the Malibu site so it has to be all wireless. Again it is a matter of cost.

 

Take away the bandwidth issues and I think they did a really good job at the Malibu. I did not see any outages but the picture quality was not always great.

 

Because of the problems with spreading news in this sport @MattP and I have cobbled together Twitter feeds from skiers to show live results on the front page of BallOfSpray. Matt has also invested a crazy amount of hours building the iPhone and Android app called BallOfScores to push those scores out live. The Twitter feeds and the smart phone apps are never going to be as rich as a live video feed but day in and day out it is a lot more dependable and convenient.

 

Until something else happens I am afraid it is a matter of managing expectations. Cross your fingers that the webcast works and watch the BallOfSpray front page or your smart phone for the BallOfScores . I think it is best when both are on line.

 

For many events I am at the lake and not at a computer, BallOfScores is better than the webcast. I am not going to stay home for scores but I can check my phone from the boat. The only reason I watched much of the webcast is because I was home feeling crappy. Otherwise I would have only followed from my phone.

 

This is not a perfect world but this is where we are at.

[Ed_Johnson]

My feed cut out also for all the Head to Heads..The good thing is that I know they record these episodes, so I just took my Guitar and a Beer and headed down to the dock...Avoided watching the results last night, and when I got up this morning watched the recorded Head to Heads, which was great.

A special thanks for recording that..It was really great to know I didn't miss it, and was wonderful watching Nate tie the Record again.

[gregy]

I'm happy just to have a chance to watch it. Like Ed my feed cut out and I caught later. I'm very appreciative of all the hard work folks put into the webcast.

[klindy]

I didn't watch continuously but I had no problems while I was watching. I did see the OW and OM slalom finals without interuption. Thanks to Kelvin and everyone else who made the webcast possible!

[Wish]

Same as others, I did not have the time to sit and watch the whole thing. But, I paused it, shut laptop and went about my business. When I had time I would open the laptop hit play and resume were it left off. Skip parts I didn't care about, and repeated the process for Saturday and the better part of today. Will be watching Jump tonight. No glitches or web feed loss and I saw what I wanted on my time. Wish I could say the same for the AtlantaPro-Am feed. Dont believe that got recorded. If it did, someone let me know. But, since I was a competitor in the 55K, I was actually web-cast skiing all over the world. How cool is that.!!! Had family and friends all over the US watching. Even Europe. @Horton said he paid them to drop the feed right before my 35 off pass in the finals (completed by the way and snagged a half at 38 to win). The feed cut off right as I was being pulled out of the water for 35 and stayed off for the next skier as well as the results. Had folks frantically texting me, my wife (who was watching with my daughter from FL) , and others to find out what the hell happened. So it was kind of a bummer for everyone watching but I gotta say what a great deal that was to be able to let people know to watch. Folks that had never seen a tournament before actually got interested. I still get emails and txts asking when the next webcast will be for me. Course I gotta tellm not till next yrs ProAm but even with the knocked out feed, it was THE coolest thing to be a part of. As with anything, technology will improve. Feeds will become cheaper and we will all benefit. Thank you Thank you Thank you to those who take the time and effort to do the web feeds. Keepm coming. I'll be watching.