U Florida Turns Distance Learning Into Searchable Video on Demand

The University of Florida is rolling out technology from Sonic Foundry to record, store and manage distance learning courses, collaborative meetings and special events that occur via videoconference. The cloud-based Mediasite Join product can record any videoconference and make the content searchable, with no additional appliances or equipment required. Users invite Mediasite Join as a participant to a videoconference, and the technology then transcodes, indexes and publishes recorded calls to Mediasite alongside the institution's other video assets.

"Our other way of capturing videoconferences merges all video and content feeds into one stream, and that's not ideal," noted Brandon Telg, IT specialist at the university. "Mediasite Join provides our students a rich media experience with separate and searchable streams for video and slides. It's integrated with our Mediasite Enterprise Video Platform already, making our lives much easier when everything is on one platform."

The University of Florida has used the Mediasite webcasting and video content management system since 2004 to capture classroom lectures and other events on campus. The Mediasite Join service will be available campuswide this fall.

About the Author

Rhea Kelly is editor in chief for Campus Technology, THE Journal, and Spaces4Learning. She can be reached at [email protected].

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