Item: IBM Video Streaming
Rating: 8
Author: Ben Keener

Overall Satisfaction with IBM Cloud Video (including Ustream)

Usability

On my end, it is very easy to use, however we still have members that have problems watching our web casts via Ustream. A simple, flawless solution to help them fix this would be great.

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We are using Ustream as a means of education here at HCI. We provide daily webcasts to our members on HR related topics. We live stream our webcasts to our members via the Ustream player onto our site. Once our members watch one of our webcasts, they are given a certification code, which is used for their continuous learning in the HR field.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Easy to start streaming
Transcoding in the Cloud
Video Quality

Cons

DVR Recording
Better player interface/more embed options/performance (buffering)
Companies block certain ports that block Ustream, a simpler way to communicate to our end users on how to fix this problem would be awesome

Alternatives Considered

YouTube and Livestream

I have used Livestream and YouTube streaming. Ustream stacks up pretty competitively to them. Ustream is probably the most reliable when it comes to the three, however, it lacks DVR support and the player and chat function seem a little outdated. We decided to go with Ustream because it is reliable and it is organized more as a "station/channel" than the others which are more "event" based.

Likelihood to Recommend

Ustream is well suited for our webcasts because people are able to watch and ask questions and have their questions asked on air. However, for our virtual classes, it is not the greatest because of the real-time participation we have between the teachers and learners. [Due to] the fact that there is a big delay based on the users' internet connection, we can not replace Adobe Connect with Ustream.

Comments

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Bob Lee
commented 9 years ago
Hi Ben. Bob from the Ustream Voice of the Customer team here... Thanks very much for taking the time to review our platform. As a veteran practitioner of online teaching and learning, I understand your comments regarding the real-time aspects of the instructor/learner interactions. We'd love to get your insights into what you need to improve this aspect of the platform. If that sounds good, just drop me a line and I'll loop in the right folks on our end. And our Customer Success team can help with the port blockage issue since this is something we run into from time-to-time. Feel free to touch base with them or, if you'd prefer, I can get someone to reach out to you. Thanks Again!

I stream You stream, we all stream for Ustream!

Software Version

Modules Used