He Web offers pontificators, armchair analysts, and unabashed attention whores more methods than ever to make their voices heard and faces seen. But blogs and podcasts are so 15 minutes ago. Now you can create your own online show. Your creation won’t have the production values of a big studio’s, but you won’t have to contend with fresh-out-of-film-school directors ruining your vision. All you need is a webcam and a dream—and a Web site called Stickam. Stickam is a social networking site that specializes in streaming live video content. There’s no limit to the number of viewers who can tune into your live feed (you can have as many viewers as your notebook’s resources will allow), and you can even schedule broadcasts. For this exercise we used an Apple MacBook Pro and its built-in iSight webcam, but any notebook and webcam combination should do. Here’s how to get started broadcasting your own online show. Create a Show 1. Create an account at Stickam.com and log in. 2. Click Edit Profile to create a profile page that will give viewers details about you and the type of programming you will produce. 3. Click My Stickam Player to tweak the look of the media player. It’s here that you will also receive the code that you can use to embed your video into a Web page or blog. Alternately, you can simply e-mail the URL within the code to interested parties. 4. Click the Go Live button and set your preferred level of camera access. You can choose to let anyone, or only registered Stickam members who are in your friends list, view your show. 5. When the live video window opens, Adobe Flash Player will ask for permission to access CreateWebshowStep7_shyour camera. Click Allow. 6. Click the microphone tab and choose your audio input from the drop-down box. 7. Click the camera tab and choose your camera input from the drop-down box. You are now ready to begin broadcasting Schedule a Show 1. Click My Page and scroll down to the bottom of the page. 2. Click the Add button. Select a date, start time (this will be used to alert your Stickam friends when you’ll next broadcast) and show duration. 3. Click Save to lock in your selection. http://laptopzine.blogspot.com/
