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I. Will. Be. Watching!
My daughter's birth two days ago was a singular experience. I'm sure any other proud father out there will attest to wonder of the miraculous process God created.
Before the day of the Big Dance, I knew I would miss having my folks and my wife's folks there in the hospital with us. When my son was born four years ago we lived in the same city and enjoyed them all being able to see the new little guy right away. I began to think of ways to bring that sense of intimacy back even though we're a day's drive away, and streaming video over the Internet came to mind. First I thought of Skype but realized that only one other party would be able to participate for video--once you add another participant in the call there is no video capability. Then I considered some of the multi-video chat services out there like Tiny Chat, but knew connectivity was sure to be an issue.
I also realized that we also wanted to maintain a sense of intimacy, which meant that any solution that allowed other participants in the stream to talk or have video would be a little too much for us. That's when I happened upon uStream.tv after googling "private video broadcast" and finding an article about a new privacy feature there. uStream.tv basically provides one-way video and audio streaming with numerous interactive features added to the experience.
I already had a ustream.tv account but had to spend a few minutes reorienting myself to the user interface, which is not the most intuitive:
I then created a new show and found the settings for it. Half way down the page there's an option to require a password. Boom. All set. I went to the show's main page where there are a slew of options for letting other people know about the show. I chose the email option and sent word to both sets of parents via email.
Voila! A very memorable stage was set for the birth experience. I set my laptop on the hospital's rolling food tray and adjusted it from time to time as our little one arrived, ensuring a 'safe' angle. Our closest family members were able to share the precious moments. They were able to text chat with me and each other as part of the ustream.tv 'show', which added another layer of meaning to the experience.
I hope you consider ustream.tv as an option if you're in the same situation we were in: a little farther from home but still wanting to share the cherished moments of life in a way that maintained a sense of intimacy for everyone.
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