Which streaming platform to use for sacrament meeting?

[mevans]

We're working to start streaming sacrament meetings in our stake. We did use the church webcast system for a stake conference a couple of weeks ago. In planning to stream sacrament meetings, people are trying to decide which streaming platform to use.

What are the pros and cons of using the church webcast system vs. You Tube and other streaming platforms? I've gathered that until rather recently, the church webcast system had some possibly significant problems. Are there technical issues (bandwidth requirements, video/audio quality, etc.) that might lead to a specific platform choice?

[mevans]

To answer my own question, I'll report on some of our research. Here's what we found:

Setup

• Church Webcast: If you have the correct calling, getting the church webcast set up is very quick and easy.
• You Tube: I believe it takes time (24 hours), email addresses, and phone numbers to set up. There have been some other posts about setting up You Tube accounts which provide more details.

Scheduling a Broadcast

• Church Webcast: All broadcasts must be scheduled in advance. You generally need at least a 30-minute advance setup for it to work.
• You Tube: Once you're set up, starting to send a stream is instant. You don't need to schedule anything.

Pre-Broadcast and Broadcast

• Church Webcast: You see Tabernacle Choir and other church videos while waiting for the broadcast to start. You keep church branding. When you start streaming, it automatically shows the broadcast.
• You Tube: You wait for the stream to start. I believe you have the app it will automatically start but if you're going through a web browser you need to periodically refresh to see if the live stream has started.

End of Program

• Church Webcast: When streaming stops, it goes back to showing Tabernacle Choir videos. Nothing was recorded, so there's no need to do anything.
• You Tube: Depending on your settings, you may see nothing, or You Tube might suddenly jump into showing other content. This could be a sudden change from the spirit of sacrament meeting. You also need to delete the recording of the meeting that You Tube automatically saves.

Conclusion
I really like the church webcast system. I like how it keeps you in the "branding" and sprit of the church. Unfortunately, each broadcast must be scheduled. I know some stakes just create a broadcast for each building each week. Still, there is no recurring broadcast, so you would need to schedule and disseminate the streaming URL and stream Id to people in every unit every week (another alternative is to call a bunch of people as assistant stake technology specialists and then teach them to log in and find the streaming info for their building).

With You Tube, we can have one account for each building. We're using the Mevo device and if you're logged in to your You Tube account from the Mevo app, it's incredibly easy to start a stream. You can stream to the church webcast system from a Mevo as well, but it involves copying and pasting the URL and stream Id. The stake presidency wants this to be simple and not require a significant amount of technical expertise. The ease of the Mevo app makes the You Tube solution rank higher. If the church webcast system had a way to do a recurring webcast and it used the same URL/stream Id for each occurrence (and the Mevo app lets you save it), it might level the playing field. If you're not using a Mevo, some of the factors we considered may not be important.

Someone is considering embedding the You Tube steam in a web page so that we might be able to remove ourselves a little bit from the You Tube branding. Whatever we do, we'll create a tiny URL to more easily disseminate the viewing link to church members. I guess we'll figure out next Sunday how well everything works.

[russellhltn]

With the tiny URL, you've eliminated the problem of disseminating the new link each week to the membership. I don't think scheduling the event each week or pasting it into an application is that complex.

Keep in mind the changing link is a form of security, since there's no login or authentication.

[Mikerowaved]

Keep in mind the changing link is a form of security, since there's no login or authentication.

I'm not seeing the downside - as long as the uplink credentials are protected. Does it matter if a random person eavesdrops? Might plant a few seeds here and there.

[russellhltn]

Keep in mind the changing link is a form of security, since there's no login or authentication.

I'm not seeing the downside - as long as the uplink credentials are protected. Does it matter if a random person eavesdrops? Might plant a few seeds here and there.

I was referring to the uplink. If someone were to somehow able to get ahold of it, you don't know what might be webcast.

[sbradshaw]

I think streams can be scheduled with YouTube. For example, general conference this weekend was a scheduled event that showed a countdown on YouTube before the live stream started. I haven't run a live YouTube event, but my suspicion is that if it's a scheduled event, and you're on the page with the countdown, you won't need to refresh to see if it's started.

[lajackson]

I haven't run a live YouTube event, but my suspicion is that if it's a scheduled event, and you're on the page with the countdown, you won't need to refresh to see if it's started.

My experience is that this is true almost every time. However, on occasion the countdown gets to zero and nothing happens. A browser page refresh usually solves the problem.

[Mikerowaved]

I think streams can be scheduled with YouTube.

Yep. I used to schedule our stake conferences well in advance, then upload an outside picture of our stake center with the name of our stake written in a nice font. This static pic is what people would see if they tried the link early. You can optionally add a countdown timer, but I never saw the need. As soon as I went live, the receive sites did also, after their usual buffer delay, of course.

[mevans]

I don't know if it's a function of the Mevo app or You Tube streaming vs. Church webcast streaming, but we had an issue: We were streaming from Mevo to You Tube and we found that as soon as you stopped streaming, the program ended. The people watching are several seconds behind the live event. Ending the stream when the closing prayer was complete at the live broadcast meant that the people at home were cut off immediately, rather than after they had finished the prayer. We learned we need to let it stream for several seconds after the prayer so that home viewers aren't cut off.

[hicksticks2001]

For us personally - we use the webcast app for the following reasons
1) The church created and invested in this platform for a reason and are making changes to it to support Ward broadcasts (you already see "Sacrament Meeting" and "Bishopric" as options in scheduling meetings)
2) It's very easy for people use - for us we tell the membership to just go to paysonworship.com and click on the appropriate ward
3) If there are problems with the technology, we know we can get official church support from HQ because we are using their services inline with how they are recommended to be used
4) I love the new "WebCast App" in the Google App Store available for "Google TV" Devices - I hope the church makes this app more available, because it makes watching even easier.

With youtube you have less control, you don't know what Google may inject as an advertisement, or next up. It does have the plus of already being embeded in every tv or smart device, but we felt after weighing everything it was best off to go with the church system. We also like using the J-Tech IP video Encoders with the custom firmware to have them automatically upload to scheduled events through the WebCast system.