Ben Roy

Today wasn't my first interaction with Ustream - I've tuned in to watch other people's broadcasts. But it's been pretty casual, and I never took any time to look around the site itself. Today was different though. Today I came at it from the other side.

Out of the blue I had a pressing need to broadcast a live video stream (I know, how in the world does that happen?). So of course my first thought was Ustream. I burned through the registration form as fast as I possibly could because the event is already under way and I wanted it up and running NOW. It was a little annoying that there were so many fields and screens, but in retrospect it doesn't seem unreasonable for free streaming video service.

As soon as I was signed up I immediately started a broadcast. I skipped the high quality download in the interest of time and got right into the admin portion. Clicking the broadcast button was pretty easy and I started distributing the URL. It literally took less than 5 minutes from start of registration to 10 people watching the live video stream.

So that brings me to my conclusion and what will have to pass as the 'point' of this post. I was left with a feeling of awe at the amazing power we have available to us. Zero cost, nearly-zero effort, and a huge set of features. It was easy to control my broadcast, I could record the whole thing with just a button press, and I could even insert poll over the video in real time. If weren't free I'd probably be trying to sell it.

People probably think it's dumb that I'm experiencing a 'wow' moment around Ustream, but realize that the self-discovery aspect, the bootstrapping if you will, was what did it for me. I didn't buy a product, I didn't read a report, I didn't see someone's review. I was aware that Ustream existed, surfed out to it, and was immediately productive (ok, productive might be an overstatement).

I think it sets an exceedingly high bar for anyone delivering software, services, or functionality on the Internet; I know it did for me.