EDITED TO ADD: Crowdcast is currently experiencing a huge surge in new users and the internet at large is facing challenging outages with everyone moving to the internet in such a small window. If you are unable to access the livestream via Crowdcast, it is also being recorded and we will also attempt to share a simulcast at https://youtu.be/Ha5LE68Qhe4
Howdy Deputies Community Program Supporters (formerly Deputies) are a team of people worldwide who review WordCamp and Meetup applications, interview lead organizers, and keep things moving at WordCamp Central. Find more about program supporters in our Program Supporter Handbook. and Organizers! We’re excited to announce that next week we’ll have three 1-hour training sessions with Brian Richards on the use of both Crowdcast and additional tools for use with organizing and presenting online conferences.
Each one-hour session will cover different topics, so you’re welcome to attend as many as you’d like. In addition to sharing this information with organizers via the calls, our big goal is to write documentation based on this information for our handbooks to support organizers moving forward with online only events.
If you can’t attend the trainings synchronously, you can still help with writing the documentation for organizers by watching the videos which we’ll post as soon as possible.
Our first session will be held Tuesday, March 17 at 1500 UTC / 11am EDT / 4pm CET
Session 1: Running Events in Crowdcast
* Creating an event in Crowdcast (title, description, cover photo, url, registration button, privacy settings)
* Editing a multi-session schedule
* Outbound streaming via RTMP
* Customizing the email messages
* Importing attendees
* Inviting speakers on-stage
* Sharing screens, apps, and tabs
* Using CTAs, Polls, and Q&A
* Chat and Attendee Moderation
* Embedding Crowdcast
* Embedding Captions
* Exporting video recordings
Our second session will be held Wednesday, March 18 at 1500 UTC / 11am EDT / 4pm CET
Session 2: Helping speakers and emcees prepare for a virtual audience
* Think of the learner
* A/V considerations (share Crowdcast setup link)
* Preparing your environment (lighting, sound, background)
* Imagine a real person in the room
* Speak with enthusiasm
* Sharing slides vs sharing screen
* Keep slides clean and concise (imagine them at 240p resolution)
* Pre-record all demos
* Schedule either a rehearsal or an A/V test within Crowdcast
* Facilitating Q&A
Our third session will be held Thursday, March 19 at 1500 UTC / 11am EDT / 4pm CET
Session 3: Working with pre-recorded content
* Risks and limitations with pre-scheduled content
* Tools and recommendations for pre-recording content
* Preparing a recording for live re-broadcast
* Uploading content to restream.io
* Scheduling content in restream.io
* Getting an RTMP feed link from Crowdcast
* Changing the output feeds in restream.io
* Monitoring stream output for issues
* Contingency planning for schedule changes or playback issues
* How to reset a session in Crowdcast
Check out this video and sign up to learn more and be prepared to start on time next week.
Again, the goal of these training sessions is to create documentation for our handbook to support our WordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. organizers as they move forward with online events.
If you’re available to help create documentation please let us know which session(s) you’re able to attend and take notes on.
Organizers are also welcome to attend these sessions and they will be made available for all once they’re completed.
Let us know if you have any questions in the comments below.
