Etherlive – Event Technology Experts

Connectivity, Event IT, Femtocell, Mobile Phone, Technology, Wireless

Mobile phones. Can’t live without them, can’t…well…er…you certainly can’t run an event without them. Mobile phone coverage continues to be a pain point for many customers. It’s normally the same story; everything is fine in the run up to the event but once the attendees arrive, making a call, using mobile internet or even sending an SMS becomes unreliable.

Telecoms operators may install temporary masts at larger events (for varying commercial arrangements) however in many cases these are only linked back to the local town, which may already be near capacity and therefore only compound the problem. Generally the mobile network in the area simply isn’t designed to handle a ‘density spike’ such as a large gathering of handsets all communicating more than is ‘normal’. For smaller and more remote events the situation is even worse, where often there is no coverage at all.

Shouting at the phone doesn't actually help, it just makes you feel better

Providing high density mobile coverage is a complex area, but a femtocell can help keep key staff connected via their mobile no matter what else is going on with the normal mobile network. Femtocell technology is essentially a miniature cell phone mast for a pre-approved list of people. The unit can be linked to the internet services on site and route a number of concurrent calls for the authorised handsets as if they were on the normal mobile phone network. With a range of 150m radius it’s the perfect unit to have at a production enclosure, box office or artist/VIP area.

The pre-approved handsets can be added in a matter of seconds, whilst the unit itself is outdoor ruggedised so can be installed on the same infrastructure which carries other services such as site Wi-Fi, like for example our communications tower light. So what’s the catch? It’s only Vodafone handsets which will work with the unit today. Although not ideal it does at least provide a way of continuing to use the service, regardless of everyone around watching their bars disappear. For non-Vodafone handsets temporary Vodafone SIMs can be provided.

The femtocell has been added to our 2011 services along with some other additional voice communication products such as a specialised wireless handset which integrates with existing VoIP services, all designed to keep an event operations team functioning smoothly.

Conference Wi-Fi – Ignore at your Peril

17 Feb 2011

Conference, Connectivity, Event IT, Press, Press Centre, Product Launch, Wi-Fi, Wireless

‘Good news travels fast, bad news travels faster’ has never been a truer saying in the social world of retweets and ‘likes’. I wasn’t at Mobile World Congress this week but I did follow the stream of tweets originating from there. Amongst those tweets were comments about poor Wi-Fi coverage, I have no idea whether the Wi-Fi was poor or not but with a few negative comments bouncing around the ether it can quickly lead to the perception that another large conference has not taken it’s audiences desire to use mobile technology seriously – particularly damaging when it’s a mobile technology conference!

The chances are it was a few people having localised problems with their devices but its another example of the damage that can be inflicted very quickly when attendees feel they are experiencing a poor service. Both Apple’s Steve Jobs and Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer have also experienced the pain of poor launch event Wi-Fi in the last year, with hundreds of press watching and commenting, and the result that the issues became a bigger headline than the product itself. So, what can you do to avoid the issues at your conference or launch?

1) Know your audience – What type of press is attending? What’s the demographic of the audience? You might think only tech events need technical services but many launches these days need high quality internet, for example London’s Fashion week had a huge amount of live blogging along with video streaming, posting of images and tweeting. Understanding these aspects is the starting point for working out what level of service is required.

2) Be realistic about capacity – Poor Wi-Fi will frustrate people more than no Wi-Fi, and good Wi-Fi with no sensible internet capacity is just as bad. Mobile data demand is growing exponentially but far too often the capacity required is under called. Budgets may be a challenge but often the problem is exasperated with last minute bookings which have a higher cost. Internet bandwidth is not something that should be an afterthought, it should be up towards the top of the requirements.

3) Work with social media – Working on the assumption that people who are tweeting and blogging will look after themselves is missing the opportunity to engage with a huge audience. People will tweet regardless so it is critical to get involved to address comments. For example if someone tweets the Wi-Fi is bad, wouldn’t it be great to send a support engineer over to check everything is OK with their system? They are then far more likely to post a positive comment.

4) Offer a variety of options – Although Wi-Fi is great there will always be someone who has a problem getting connected, having somewhere for people to go and plug a cable in as a fall back creates a great impression. Couple that with support staff who understand the common issues around firewalls, VPNs, connection agents and drivers and the press will feel they are being catered for.

5) Partner with the venue – Don’t just accept that the venue provided Wi-Fi will work for you and your customers’ requirements, in the vast majority of cases this is not the case. Check they have dealt with a similar scale of event, understand how they intend to support users, question their capacity. High capacity Wi-Fi is a very different game to a typical casual usage Wi-Fi installation and many common wireless products are just not up to the job.

It may be a cliche that we ‘live in a connected world’ but we do, which is both powerful and dangerous, and most importantly is something that cannot be ignored if you want to maximise good exposure.

Taking Event Comms Seriously

05 Feb 2011

Broadband, Connectivity, Event IT, Festival, VoIP, Wi-Fi, Wireless

The Event Production Show 2011

Having spent a couple of days last week at the Event Production Show talking to existing and potential customers it’s interesting to note down some of the common themes we are hearing and challenges people are facing around technology.

Underpinning many of the discussions I had was an increased focus on the importance of event connectivity. It has moved from a nice to have, through must have, to critical as more and more services rely on it. With that more organisers now understand some of the challenges in terms of capacity and performance and, for example, weaknesses such as ‘upload’ performance on ADSL and the problem with latency on satellite, which renders VPN and VoIP services nearly unusable. We are not locked to a single provider or service and can offer everything from BT lines through to satellite, WiMAX and fibre, depending on requirements, budget and time. Understanding what capacity is really required is a critical step in the process.

The cost of connectivity remains a concern but there are a few ways to keep cost under control, firstly book early! The shorter the notice the less options there are, and at short notice services often need to be expedited leading to significant extra charges. Secondly consolidate, reduce the number of lines by using VoIP and use a proper managed network to share and control bandwidth effectively. Lastly look at longer term options – if you are going to be using the same site for several years it is often cheaper to install permanent connectivity rather than temporary services as the main cost is the installation, with the annual rental often much lower than the cost of reinstalling each year. We now do this for a number of customers and manage all the technical and paperwork aspects so that the service is available when needed.

Another common comment was ‘we tried to use 3G but it was a disaster’. Running event connectivity on 3G is a highly risky strategy, at best it is likely to give poor and intermittent performance and more commonly during an event it is completely unusable, even when additional mobile towers have been placed on site. If an event needs connectivity then it needs managed connectivity, not ‘cross your fingers and hope’. The difference in cost between using a 3G approach and a basic professional set-up is not as large as people often think and there are many benefits.

Over the last couple of years the interest in site-wide attendee Wi-Fi has increased significantly and that trend continued this year. Alongside the general desire to allow people to stay connected the other big driver is the use of smartphone apps. Providing an application at an event with no additional connectivity generally results in unfavourable reviews as the performance is poor. The good news is that in many cases extending Wi-Fi internet coverage to the public is not as big a problem as it may seem, provided it is done correctly using appropriate hardware and managed networks with features such as traffic shaping. There are various models for cost recovery including ‘hotspot’ type charging or advertising and branding.

Integration of services is another key issue with production, ticketing, merchandise, bars and catering, security, etc. all having their own specific needs. Bringing all this together successfully requires experience and extensive IT knowledge. Making sure everyone is talking and sharing requirements is part of the service we provide so that you do not need to worry about the fact that the ticketing company require an onsite SQL database and a site-to-site VPN connection to a hosting centre you have never heard of!

Event IT is it’s own specialist area, you wouldn’t dream of letting any old person run your sound system, provide power, operate ticketing or put up marquees, and the same is true of event IT if want a dependable service which meets your needs.

The Etherlive stand saw a steady stream of enquiries for dependable event IT services

Satellite Broadband: Will it work for your Event?

29 Nov 2010

ADSL, Broadband, Connectivity, Event, Event IT, Festival, Satellite, VoIP, Wireless

Last week in the news much was made of a dedicated satellite launch for broadband Internet access (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11846237). Satellite Internet access is nothing new and varying levels of service are available today but this launch, along with a couple of others that are planned, do bring additional bandwidth and some improved services. With this in mind I thought it would be useful to cover the good and bad of satellite Internet and whether it can help at your event. At a high level the pros and cons are as follows:

Pros

Relatively quick to deploy at short notice
No requirement for any physical wired infrastructure to the site
Relatively high bandwidth (primarily download) can be purchased compared to low-end broadband

Cons

Requires line of sight (roughly to southern horizon and an associated Fresnel zone area)
Requires alignment (although automatic motorised systems are now available)
Very high latency (delay) impacts usability for some applications
Can suffer weather impacts such as rain fade
Higher bandwidth tends to require a larger dish
Tends to work out very costly for longer duration events

For an event organiser some of these points are very important, for example the high latency makes the use of most VPNs virtually impossible which is a real problem if for example you need to run a ticketing system connected via VPN. VoIP services also suffer with high latency meaning delays and ‘Darlek’ effects. There are some improvements with the latest generation services but the simple fact is that satellites are a long way away and will always suffer high latency. It is also important to not assume a satellite dish will have line of sight – there are many situations where getting visibility to the southern horizon is harder than expected and it is also import to factor in the Fresnel zone, this effect means that a small gap between two buildings or trees may not work as expected.

Not all satellite services are the same. Different satellites have different ‘footprints’ meaning they cover different parts of Europe. Many providers also use contention ratios on satellite services too in a similar way to wired ADSL/Broadband services. There are a range of speed options ranging from consumer type services up to more business/professional levels, some services are also optimised for digital video links rather than web browsing.

So, in summary, when should you use satellite? When there really are no other options. We can, and do use satellite from time to time but it is the last resort and requires careful planning to ensure the service delivered meets the requirements. We always work with customers to review all options and recommend the most appropriate solution.

Event IT: Key Points from 2010 to help you in 2011

10 Nov 2010