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Home My Public Portal AboutCable Television Advisory -- 2006-05-03 Minutes Minutes of the meeting of the Brewster Cable TV Advisory Committee scheduled for 7:00 pm on Wednesday 3 May 2006. The meeting is called to order at 7:08 pm on Wednesday 3 May 2006 by Lany Greeley. Members present at this time aze: Larry Greeley Norman Adams Walter Powers Ellie Smith Art Stringer In the audience area there is just one person: Steve Lipman. Norman Adams distributes copies of the meeting of Wednesday 5 April 2006. Walter Powers makes and Art Stringer seconds a motion to accept the minutes of the meeting of Wednesday 5 Apri12006 as presented. The vote to accept is unanimous. Carol Chichetto arrives at 7:15 pm. Members now present are: Larry Greeley Norman Adams Carol Chichetto Walter Powers Ellie Smith Art Stringer Larry distributes to each member a copy of a letter to Mary O'Keeffe concerning the activation of the Brewster governmental channel, the payment by Comcast to the town of Brewster of a supplemental license fee of 1.5%, and the return feed from the Brewster Town Hall. This letter is dated Apri124, 2006 and is signed by Lang Greeley (as Chairman of the Brewster Telecommunications/Advisory Board) and by James Foley (as Chairman of the Brewster Board of Selectmen). Larry asks Walter about the report called for in the meeting of 5 April 2006 in the motion recorded in the minutes of that meeting to wit: "That Walter Powers go to the Community Access studio in Orleans and prepare a list of obviously unsatisfactory equipment there and report back at the next meeting of this committee." Walter responds that the specified report has been delayed due to the medical condition of Steve Duerksen on whom Walter is relying for technical expertise. Larry introduces the person in the audience, Steve Lipman, as President and CEO of a small company just starting up called "Cape Cod e-com". The goal is to make video material of local interest (such as a meeting of a local town board or committee) more available to home viewers by using streamed video over the internet. Steve Lipman describes the use of streaming video and live video broadcasts as among the most powerful ways to distribute information from the town to its citizens. Such video distribution, while technically possible over dial-up connections, is much more practical if the ultimate viewer has high speed access to the internet. r w He discusses the state of his efforts which are now providing occasional such streams on an experimental basis. T'he "experiment" is not technical (the technique and the equipment and the software are all well developed) but rather lies in the problems of arranging the necessary access to the video material combined with the necessary access to the intemet, all at a cost that is manageable. A video stream originating as coverage of a public meeting in Barnstable is currently available at: town. barnstable. ma. us/state As an example of software resources that are already available he mentions a package called "Media Encoder". It is a free application made available by Microsoft which allows the conversion of analog video signals to digital form. For distribution via the Internet video must be in digital form. Digital information is more easily handled for storage and the physical means for digital storage (typically hard disks) are growing rapidly in capacity and dropping in cost. The devices which handle the digitized video material ("servers") aze also -like most electronic devices - increasing in performance and dropping in cost. Modem servers can supply many simultaneous streams of different video material, a capability which is currently exploited by Comcast to offer "on demand" video. Such an "on demand" sort of system would be very useful for distributing information such as videos of meetings inasmuch as each different viewer wants to see a different one or few of the many available meetings etc, and preferably at a time convenient for the particular viewer. In his preliminary discussions with Barnstable the possibility has been raised of producing and distributing video of every public meeting - a total of perhaps 71 hours per week, week in and week out. A dedicated server system big enough to handle such a load would cost about $300 per month to rent. A smaller server which could store and access 5 gigabytes of digitized video would cost about $69 per month to rent. He concludes his presentation and at 7:55 pm he leaves the meeting. (Steve Lipman responded to a number of general questions from the committee during his presentation, and the relevant substance of those responses has been assimilated into the above notes on his remarks.) One question which arose during the presentation (but which is not in the area of Steve's knowlege) was, why is there no Comcast service to certain specific small areas of Brewster when the franchise agreement seems to suggest that all potential subscribers in Brewster will be served? No satisfactory answer was offered by Steve or by any of the committee members. Larry reports briefly on asemi-formal meeting in the Wellfleet COA at 10 am on Saturday 22 Apri12006. This meeting was attended by people from most of the 6 Lower Cape towns. The scheduled principal topic of this meeting was a presentation by Nancy Richards who is the director of Plymouth Area Community TV (PACTV). PACTV is an independent provider of management services for community access TV (all three elements of "PEG" ie Public Access and Educational Access and Govermental Access) to Plymouth MA and to Kingston MA. The next meeting of this multi-town group, is scheduled for 10 am on this coming Saturday, 6 May 2006, at the Wellfleet Library. The scheduled principal topic of this 6 May meeting is a similar presentation by Terry Duenas about the operation of the Cape Cod Media Center (formerly "C3TV") which handles the Public Access channels of several mid-Cape towns. Terry is the manager of that facility, reporting to a board of directors drawn from the several towns served by that facility. Carol Chichetto comments that she is closely acquainted with the Cape Cod Media Center and with Terry Duenas. She evaluates him as capable and trustworthy. r Larry remarks that Comcast has responded to Eastham's initial document concerning the renewal of the cable TV franchise in Eastham. A brief flurry of conversation makes clear that the next meeting of this committee is expected to take place at the regular time, ie, at 7:00 pm on the first Wednesday of next month, which is 7 June 2006. The meeting seems to be out of other business to be taken up tonight. Art Stringer makes a motion to adjourn. It is seconded by Walter Powers and is passed unanimously at 8:14 pm. Submitted by Norman Adams, Clerk, Brewster CTVAC _~,~ ~~'' ~wt.~~, ~Gt'~ s __ S£: £d 11~r90. V Z~ , ... ~~~ ~. .~i ~~V~3~8