My recent experience with the webcasting portal for a Regional event was very confusing and problematic.
I've spoken with the GSC about some of my issues (even a higher tier) but I feel letting others know about these issues will help them through confusion in case modifications to the portal don't come.
Here's a little background. My stake is hosting a 10-stake devotional hosted by an Apostle and I am responsible for the success of the broadcast to 9 locations in different stakes. Since this was my first time with an event this large, I found getting things set up was complicated and confusing. There is a lot of information you will need for scheduling and completing the event. When we had our first test broadcast, it failed miserably. Some of the reasons and confusing issues are listed below. Hopefully this information will help you have better success than I.
Setting up receiving locations for other stakes is a little complicated. You will need to know the following from each stake.
- Unit Number ID and Stake Name (to see and assign receiving locations of a different stake)
- The address of the receiving building or name listed for the location (to select the receiving location)
- The lds.org username for the assistant (to add to your profile for the new assistant assignments and to gain access)
- Assistant's contact information
When adding receiving locations, you may discover buildings which are shared by multiple stakes.
What gets confusing is when an assistant logs into the Portal and scrolls down for his building and selects the building's name which looks familiar to him, but that location was reserved for a different stake. The actual stake the location was intended for cannot connect and view the URL because the link is in use by the first assistant.
- Shared Locations 1.png (28.51 KiB) Viewed 1762 times
Another issue we had was when a receiving location had been disconnected, and attempts to reconnect through the Portal fail. The URL reports the location is in use, and you can not connect. The Global Service Center's solution to this situation is to use the Event Code for the webcast. We found a solution by creating hyperlinks and saving them on the desktop, bookmarks or in emails. We found we could successfully reconnect and even bypass the portal. I just prepare an email to all the assistant with hyperlinks pointing them to the proper link for their building:
- hyperlinks.png (27.09 KiB) Viewed 1762 times
Lastly, when monitoring the health of the receiving locations, you may find it difficult to know who to contact regarding a problem. You will not know who the assistant is or stake receiving because the only reference you will have available is the name of the building.
Hopefully the Portal will be modified in the future to show the assistant's information next to the location name.