AV SuperFriends

Recorded June 11, 2021 It's summer! Spend the next three hours as the AV SuperFriends review all their summer projects, one by one. No, that's boring and tedious. We're all doing the same thing you're doing at your school. Instead, let's talk supply chain. We're joined by Clay Stahlka, Senior PreSales Engineer at Starin to talk about the current situation regarding the AV and electronics supply ch...

Recorded June 18, 2021 Trade shows are back and that means lists upon lists of trade show awards! We look at a list from ISE by Commercial Integrator and CE Pro and note some awards that make sense and some that seem suspicious. Also, Jamie really doesn't like "listicles" like this. Then, let's talk AV department branding and identity? What is our current AV department called? Are those names out...

Recorded June 4, 2021 It's June so hopefully you have your summer orders submitted because it's too late now! We start with a quick look at AVIXA's recent survey on commercial AV salaries, certifications, and job satisfaction and how those might be reflected in Higher Ed. We then review a report from Commercial Integrator about the future of distance learning written by non-educators, though one o...

Recorded May 14, 2021 The AV SuperFriends welcome Mandy Beckner, President and Chief Operating Officer at THE rAVe Agency to the show and peer into our Magic 8 Ball to determine what tradeshows, conferences, and events are going to look like in the future. The 8 Ball says "Reply hazy, try again," which isn't terribly helpful. Some events are already returning with various approaches to COVID-19 sa...

Recorded May 21, 2021 Let's start with some AV industry news about two integrators merging. Wait, why are we covering this? Ah, because Marc sees this as a coordinated move into the education vertical. After all, schools have money (CARES or otherwise), a need to spend it, and generally their staff are easy to push around. Next up, it's summer project show & tell! We each talk about a project that...

Recorded May 14, 2021 We start with our take on an article from Inside Higher Ed, which says "Students Want Online Learning Options Post-Pandemic." In related news, water is wet and my son wants only hot dogs for dinner. Next, we take a deep dive into the world of training, professional development, and industry certifications. Most of us have a collection of letters we can attach to our signature...

Is AV part of IT? It's a topic that keeps coming up in the larger higher ed AV circle and it's the focus of our discussion this month. Did you know there are still schools out there who don't consider their AV department to be under the auspices of IT? Some are located in the library, some are under the Provost, some are under facilities, some are part of the TV/video production team, and some are...

Recorded April 23, 2021 What does the phrase "distance education" mean at our institutions? Is it the same as "online education" or are those distinct models? And are we going to change those definitions post-COVID? We discuss a few recent news stories that higher education is considering looking into possibly doing some sort of distance education model… whatever that might mean. We also beat up e...

Recorded April 9, 2021 Is Higher Ed AV a type of Professional AV? There certainly are enough universities acting as in-house integrators, but we know it isn't always that cut and dry. The fact that a university paid for a boundary mic on a pole tells us there is still work to be done. Seriously, a boundary mic on a camera extension pole, and people are proud enough to make press releases about it....

On a recent episode, we peered 20 years into the future to imagine what universities and learning spaces might look like. The most fun aspect of that discussion was trying to the envision technologies that would be in use at the time. It was a balance between outlandish and very real technology of 2021, even if it currently exists only as a tech demo. On this episode, the AV SuperFriends are all o...

Recorded March 26, 2021 We start by discussing our love/hate relationships with a specific large interactive monitor. We still aren't sure if we like it or not, but it seems to be the best tool for the job. That might be damning with faint praise, but when it does everything you want but nothing you need, I'm not sure you will get a better endorsement. Chris walks us through AV history as he descr...

Recorded March 19, 2021 This entire episode is about 4K resolution and all the benefits and issues that come along with it. And by 4K, we mean UHD or 3840 x 2160. Larry asks, if you were planning a new classroom building, would you design entirely to make the most use of 4k resolution in standard classrooms?  Does that mean every room with 20-foot ceilings for properly-sized displays?  If so, thos...

This is a recording the AV SuperFriends did with Erik Ofgang of Tech & Learning about podcasting in education and podcasting for educators. We cover everything from what types of microphones are best, to how many co-hosts you should have (hint: less than five), to how often you should publish, to developing your story before going shopping. Thanks to Erik for putting up with us! Erik's article is...

Recorded February 12, 2021 Well, it's Groundhog Day… again. This month's theme is supposed to be "the one year anniversary of COVID-19" but as that's something we've all been living 24/7, it fell flat as a topic of discussion for the AV SuperFriends. Instead, we decided to look at long term impacts that COVID might have on higher ed AV and eLearning. We managed to push a monitor cart up to 88 mph...

Recorded February 19, 2021 (The audio quality gets pretty spotty at times on this recording. Sorry, listeners.) Years ago, the only way to do video conferencing was via proprietary hardware.  They had limited interoperability— remember the old People + Content model? — but you could always tell when you connecting to a different system.  Then we started exploring the idea of using PCs as the cente...

The big news is that Infocomm has moved— but not out of Orlando, so we can all continue to experience the added risk of a hurricane. But, if AVIXA can't fix the location, they did a good job fixing the date. We react to the news and discuss why we hope this is a long term change (seriously, who wants to go to Vegas and Orlando in the middle of summer?). On that note, have we considered Infocomm: N...

For this month's show, we're celebrating our love… of AV.  And it's going to get messy in here. It's February, and as legally required by Hallmark and your Great Aunt Silvia, this show will be Valentine's Day themed. We each have a box on our desk and we're going to go around and virtually drop off little cards covered with stickers, glue, and glitter… and foil-wrapped candy. We share our backgrou...

Recorded January 22, 2021 What is the perfect Higher Ed AV team size? The AV SuperFriends dig into this topic and come up with the perfect answer! OK, not really, but we do find out that one of our universities has more AV employees than the rest of us combined… and they still need more, more, more! We discuss how different responsibilities affect team structure and attempt to come up with a ratio...

Recorded January 8, 2021 It's the start of a new year and the AV SuperFriends are off the rails again.   We start the show with a sincere apology to all the students, teachers, and parents out there until Rachel tells how she really feels and we have to mark this episode as *EXPLICIT* Next, we introduce a new segment where we do a deep dive into the technical details of a recently-completed projec...

Recorded December 18, 2020 (Producer's Note: There's some background noise throughout this episode that we didn't catch until after the recording.  Lo siento con carne!) It's January, so let's plan for summer!   Chris is really, really upset with "Classrooms of the Future" (but not necessarily for the reasons you think) and give them both barrels.  Do you have a Classroom of the Future?  Isn't it...

How many projects and installations are universities tackling over the holidays this year compared to last? For some of us, a lot-- for some, none. Weird. Then Jeff Peterson and Jordan Basham return to continue the discussion from our last episode about university athletics AV, managing student employees, the future of live AV production, and the critical importance of being able to properly over/...

Shure buys Stem Audio- are they making a play at the conference room market? (Hint: Yes). The AV SuperFriends are joined by Jeff Peterson from Oregon State University and Jordan Basham from Western Kentucky University to talk about AV for NCAA and Athletics as well as the interaction between academic AV and athletics AV. Also, what happens when you have a student you just can't let escape? Finally...

Originally recorded November 20, 2020 Plug in the twinkle lights, shine up your aluminum pole, and get out the fancy liquor— it's time for the holidays with the AV SuperFriends! In keeping with the theme of general end-of-year merriment and holiday wishlists, we all share our letters to Santa asking for our favorite AV-related products… or items that don't quite exist, but should. And Chris shares...

Originally recorded November 13, 2020 and November 20, 2020. We have a news flash about Flash, where we share our flashing disbelief at the way the industry has prepared for the long-awaited end of Flash. Spin up your VMs and disable Windows Update! Then, Dr. Jon Dorbolo returns to continue our exploration of technology and pedagogy with a look at what the future might bring. Finally, we all went...

The AV SuperFriends sit down with Dr. Jon Dorbolo from Oregon State University to talk about the interaction of technology and pedagogy.  Jon quickly puts us all in our place and runs circles around all of us-- except maybe Rachel and Larry-- as he provides a history lesson on teaching online over the last 30 years.  Also, remember Gopher?  And Turbo Gopher?