[LINK] Government teleconferencing

[Tom Worthington]

At 11:08 AM 12/03/2009, Scott Howard wrote:
>... Yes, I've used Telepresence, and it is everything it's hyped up to be and
>more! ... The end result is something you have to experience to believe. ...

I assume that this will be sort of thing which the Department of 
Defence will get for its virtual reality command rooms. The way their 
tender was worded it made it sound like the holo-deck from Star Trek 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2009/02/virtual-reality-for-commanding.html>.

However, I hope that the government also invests in some lower cost 
tele-conference systems which can be more widely deployed. The DoD 
RFT required their hi-tech system be compatible with lower-capability 
systems. It would also be useful to have some units in carry-on 
luggage size hard cases for remote and emergency use 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2007/08/portable-learning-centre.html>.

Room N101 at the ANU was equipped with wall sized screen, three high 
resolution video projectors, cameras and a ceiling covered with 
microphones. You could have a video conference with dozens of remote 
locations and anyone in the room could talk to anyone remotely using 
the Access Grid <http://www.accessgrid.org/>. But the system was so 
complicated, it was not used much. I found a netbook with Skype much 
more useful.



Tom Worthington FACS HLM tom.worthington at tomw.net.au Ph: 0419 496150
Director, Tomw Communications Pty Ltd            ABN: 17 088 714 309
PO Box 13, Belconnen ACT 2617                      http://www.tomw.net.au/
Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Australian National University