When I was the director of communications for Lausanne II in Manila, we didn’t have any problems with wireless internet connections or with broadband connections for instant delivery of video.  No, widespread use of the Internet was merely a gleam in Al Gore’s mind back then.  But today, at Cape Town 2010, many people and planned programs are relying on fast, robust connections.

According to the onsite Tech Squad, Cape Town 2010 is using twice as much bandwidth than any gathering in the history of the Cape Town International Convention Center, and more bandwidth than was used during the World Cup games.

In addition to the 4,000 on-site participants from 197 countries, the Congress extends to an anticipated 100,000 individuals at nearly 700 GlobaLink sites in more than 95 countries worldwide. GlobaLink allows users to download videos from the Congress — in a number of different formats and languages — along with a synopsis and study questions, allowing them to hear voices from around the globe challenging the Church in the 21st century.

Those GlobaLink sites were to be served by the Internet – but the IT infrastructue of the Congress was hit by a cyber attack.  Millions of malicious attacks coming from several locations plus a virus brought the Internet throughput to a stand still.

In God’s providence, two cousins from Bangalore, India were attending the Congress as volunteers in the IT department.  They were intending to simply hook up computers and other basic IT tasks, but when word of the problem reached them, they revealed they had a unique expertise in the exact problems the Congress was experiencing.  They were the individuals God used to shut down the attack and bring the system back up to full speed.  Now all GlobaLink sites are getting the feed as planned.

Pretty cool, huh?  Two humble guys (one working at a major international IT firm, and the other with a doctorate in computational biology) were willing to volunteer to do the mundane, but God had them in place to do a great service at a time of great need.  It’s like the boy with the bread and fish, give what you have to the Lord and see what He will do with it.

PS:  I finished today’s video report – it’s on reconciliation (in the context of South Africa) I’ll have it posted for you tomorrow.

I’m overseeing a large project that has several producers working on individual segments. This process is incredibly rewarding, giving me the opportunity to work with very creative friends that I rarely get the chance to interact with.  It’s also been a great learning opportunity. I’ve discovered new ways of organizing and managing creative people and fueling the process of fostering creativity.  But I’ve also gotten so frustrated that I [edit out nasty things], well, suffice it to say, this process has had moments that have made me crazed.  I’m going to write about some of them over the life of this project.  Here’s the first.  Try talking… [Read more →]

My right shoulder has been proud to hold a wide array of cameras — first were the CP-16, Eclair ACL2 and Arri-BL film cameras, then the RCA TK-76 and Ike HL-79. Finally came the death of 3/4″ and a long series of better and better Sony Betacams. Then digibeta cameras and various DVCPro configurations. Now I use a Sony XD HD that makes pretty pictures but it has something in common with all of the other cameras I have traveled the world with:  they’re big.

Today I just worked to get a small high-def camera for an upcoming shoot. It’s amazing… low light capability, tape or flash drive recording, a real lens. Pop that baby on a carbon fiber tripod and slap a micro led light panel on the hot shoe; attach a mini wireless receiver and you’re set to make great broadcast TV and everything can fit in a carry on bag!  I love it!

My shoulder can still support the big cameras, but for all of my international and disaster stuff – give me the small camera, please.

Not long ago I blogged about Twitter [click here to read it] and wasn’t really all that complementary.  But what a power peer pressure is!  Some of my best friends are active twitters, or is it tweeters… check out what Michael “Holy Cow” Buckingham and Mark “Hardly Normal” Horvath are up to [ @holycowcreative and @hardlynormal ].

So scroll down the page a bit and glance over to your right and you’ll see a new feature… a Twitter box where you can read my latest Twitter post, which I think is really called a Tweet.  In fact, click at the bottom of the box and you can follow me and see what strikes me as interesting throughout the day.

My Twitter highlight so far is having Guy Kawasaki, one of my marketing / evangelism heros, reply to my comment about the high frequency of his excellent tweets. (I’m just learning this stuff, I didn’t know the tweet would go to him just because I listed his contact name in my message! Sorry Guy!)  Who knows, maybe next he’ll comment on one of my blog posts!

I have produced thousands of hours of live and live-to-tape television, and the majority of all problems have come from IFB (interruptible foldback- that ear piece allowing a mix-minus feed of audio) or the prompter (the screens that allow the speaker to read the script whilst looking out at the cameras).

Last night at the Republican National Convention, the prompter demon reared its ugly head during the magnificent speech by Gov. Sarah Palin. [Read more →]

I love technology, I’m not on the bloody edge of tech, but I’m usually an early adopter.  That being said, what’s up with Twitter?  I’m not sure if it’s cool or just weird.  (But that didn’t keep me from signing up!) http://twitter.com/joesindorf

I mean, I love Michael Buckingham, but I’m not sure I couldn’t live without knowing that he was “off to coffeeshop to work on HOW stuff”.  Oh wait, that was a Twit (or is it a Tweet?) from yesterday.

Oh no!  Where’s he now, and what’s he doing?  I must know!

Help me out.  Has anyone found a good reason to twitter your life away?