Media Hub at General Convention

from ENS

"The Media Hub provides a way for telling the story of General Convention in real time," said Mike Collins, director of digital media.

"The Media Hub will help make the work of our church and the legislative process more transparent," said Chris Clement, web developer.

Seven areas will be featured on the Media Hub: calendar, video stream, Flickr photos, activity area, legislative tracker, Twitter feed, and resources.

The first is the complete calendar of events, detailing the daily GC09 schedule as well as special events during both the day and evening hours. "On each item in the calendar," Collins said, "there will be an icon to indicate if the event will be covered live, or if video on-demand is available."

The largest area will be the live video stream of many wide-reaching events occurring GC09, such as briefings, legislative hearings, and special events. "The live stream will vary every day," Collins explained, "but the programming will all be listed in the calendar." There will also be a library of videos on-demand, including all the sermons presented at the Daily Eucharists.

Another area, the Flickr photos, will feature snapshots of aspects of life at GC09. Deputies, alternates, bishops and visitors will be able to easily upload photos to this site at the Church Center booth in the exhibit hall.

The Activity area will aggregate content that is relative to GC09 from a wide array of sources, including Episcopal News Service; articles from diocesan publications, religious and secular press; comments from people on Twitter and Facebook; and other sources.

The legislative tracker will enable viewers to follow the life of a resolution and ties directly into the actions and votes of GC09 through the GC database.

Media Hub's Twitter feed will be a source for announcements. "It's our way of letting people know offsite or in the hall when an event is about to begin, if a room has changed, when something goes live," Collins explained. "We can quickly communicate with the entire General Convention and those watching offsite."

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Of course this idea assumes that everyone is going to pay the $12.95/day or whatever it costs to have internet access at the convention center. For chinzes like me, I'll be working off my iPhone.