# Competition webcams? (was: A potentially interesting thing to see)



## SparkZer00 (Jun 17, 2009)

I got this great idea today:

I watched a baseball game on Sunday and realized that as I sat there, people at their homes could be watching the same game in real time.

Why can't cubing be like this?

Obviously ESPN is not going to do coverage of cubing events, but my proposal is that on a competition's WCA page, there could be a link or applet that would open of some sort so that a webcam on a laptop/computer used to enter times into a spreadsheet could be accessed by anyone so that they could see people solving in real time.

There are some pros to this:
- No waiting for results to be posted
- If records of some sort are set, people could witness this
- Ideally, If a record is set, the webcam's video could be rewound and trimmed, so that there is always a video of it

Some cons:
- Not everywhere where there is a competition there is also a webcam
(However, maybe a raise in competition entry fee temporarily could generate enough funds for one in the future)
- At larger competitions, not every solving station can be seen with one webcam
(But, again, a temporary competition entry fee raise, or an option for people who own a webcam to allow its view to be accessed through the wca page could solve this problem)
- No one is going to watch the competition all day long, and this might slow down the wca site, etc.


This is just an idea, and please, don't argue fine details right now, just talk about the main concept


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## masterofthebass (Jun 17, 2009)

..............................................................

this has been done numerous times. 'nuff said.


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## PatrickJameson (Jun 17, 2009)

It's called 'Live Results'. Some competitions have this which allows you to see the results as they are getting received. There are also some competitions who set up a webcam as well. It's all up to whoever is willing to do it/the organizer.


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## Lucas Garron (Jun 17, 2009)

At SF09, results were updated live online as they were typed in. More live than that would take special equipment or a dedicated team.

Other comps have had webcams. I'm interested in the idea of a webcam at Stanford/Berkeley/Exploratorium in the future, but right now it's not a focus. Rather interested by the capabilities of BoinxTV, though.
(The Exploratorium also has a camera which can film from above. I don't want to go through asking them to dedicate the operating cost and labor.)


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## jcuber (Jun 17, 2009)

PatrickJameson said:


> It's called 'Live Results'. Some competitions have this which allows you to see the results as they are getting received. There are also some competitions who set up a webcam as well. It's all up to whoever is willing to do it/the organizer.



Concerning live results: I know dan did it a few times, and every time it didn't update itself for me. (I did click refresh) 

Concerning webcams: I have only ever seen this once.


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## SparkZer00 (Jun 17, 2009)

jcuber said:


> PatrickJameson said:
> 
> 
> > It's called 'Live Results'. Some competitions have this which allows you to see the results as they are getting received. There are also some competitions who set up a webcam as well. It's all up to whoever is willing to do it/the organizer.
> ...



I've never seen webcams at all

I'm not a pro on live results, but seeing that a world record has been set and a video of it three days later is not as good as seeing it live over the internet

Even though it has been done at many competitions, as you claim, I would want it all to be more accessible, again, with a link on the comp's wca page. Maybe I'm just blind, but I have never seen that before (You guys seem to be implying that the webcam access has been through the competition's site, not wca, i think)


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## PatrickJameson (Jun 17, 2009)

jcuber said:


> PatrickJameson said:
> 
> 
> > It's called 'Live Results'. Some competitions have this which allows you to see the results as they are getting received. There are also some competitions who set up a webcam as well. It's all up to whoever is willing to do it/the organizer.
> ...



Well that's at the fault of the people running the program/programming the program(*cough*dan*cough*)

Webcams, again, are all up to the competitors that are willing to bring something. If people discuss this beforehand, this could be achieved pretty easily. Also, it has been done at many competitions.

EDIT:


SparkZer00 said:


> Even though it has been done at many competitions, as you claim, I would want it all to be more accessible, again, with a link on the comp's wca page. Maybe I'm just blind, but I have never seen that before (You guys seem to be implying that the webcam access has been through the competition's site, not wca, i think)



There are always threads on this forum advertising the webcam/live results if they are available.


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## pcharles93 (Jun 17, 2009)

SparkZer00 said:


> jcuber said:
> 
> 
> > PatrickJameson said:
> ...



I really don't care about seeing live results. I also don't think seeing a world record being set live is any better than an uploaded video days later. Webcasts are usually grainy, lit in unusual ways, or obstructed partially by whatever.


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## SparkZer00 (Jun 17, 2009)

pcharles93 said:


> SparkZer00 said:
> 
> 
> > jcuber said:
> ...



Not necessarily, some cameras have a webcam capability, the only thing that might stand in its way would be lag 

And this doesn't imply that you can only have webcam view of a comp, and not competitor shot footage as well


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## SparkZer00 (Jun 17, 2009)

PatrickJameson said:


> SparkZer00 said:
> 
> 
> > Even though it has been done at many competitions, as you claim, I would want it all to be more accessible, again, with a link on the comp's wca page. Maybe I'm just blind, but I have never seen that before (You guys seem to be implying that the webcam access has been through the competition's site, not wca, i think)
> ...



But, with so many other threads around it, a WCA link/function would make it much easier

sorry for the double post


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## Bryan (Jun 17, 2009)

SparkZer00 said:


> Some cons:
> - Not everywhere where there is a competition there is also a webcam
> (However, maybe a raise in competition entry fee temporarily could generate enough funds for one in the future)



You realize that bandwidth in many places is really fast download, slow upload. To be able to have 4 quality feeds would take a lot of expensive bandwidth that colleges would have, but many other places wouldn't. Besides, if I have extra money, I'll spend it on things like more timer displays.


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## Ton (Jun 17, 2009)

For upcoming events that I co-organize, live result will be available

Webcams depends on funding of the connection and availability of broadband,
not all our location support broadband internet in most cases is just one Wifi connections...

For Czech and Indonesia I have one Wifi connection


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## JBCM627 (Jun 17, 2009)

Bryan said:


> You realize that bandwidth in many places is really fast download, slow upload. To be able to have 4 quality feeds would take a lot of expensive bandwidth that colleges would have, but many other places wouldn't.


Which is one of the only reasons we could have 4 (I even meant for it to be 5) at the Ohio Open. That, and Shaden had 3 extra cameras laying around, and a number of people came who were willing to donate laptops.


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