Why the Trip?

By: Larry Bloomfield

 

There are very few opportunities for engineers to see, first-hand, what’s new and to have the chance keep up with the latest “whatevers.” Not sending at least one engineer to NAB is tantamount to stifling their technical education and preventing the facility from keep abreast of what’s going on out there in the wonderful world of not only television, but the transition to DTV. How utterly stupid! 

 

We’ve decided to do the Road Show again, after NAB 2004. As you know from the last two years and the website, we do this so that there is at lease some of the new technology from NAB getting out to the grassroots engineers that didn’t make it to the big one in the desert. Our first year, 2002, we had approximately 450 total attendance at the 31 venues we visited. Our second year, 2003, we had over 1055 total attendance at the 36 venues we visited. The Tech-Notes Taste of NAB Road Show is not and never has been intended to be a substitute for the real thing.

We ask companies with technology they'd like to get out to the grassroots engineer to help us by underwriting efforts such as these. Tech-Notes has no income and does not make any money. It is a work of love – it always has been, so when we do things like the Taste of NAB Road Show, we need all the help we can get – both nationally and locally.

So far the response has been very good and that's great! Anyone out there that would like their technology delivered to thirty or more venues, let us know so we can plan to include you in our trip.

The deciding factors were many. First, we got a lot of good support at the more successful venues. I’d give us a seven-five percent or more. We made mistakes and even canceled Orland, FL and Chicago. That would have made it thirty-three venues, but it was not meant to be in those locations last year. Who knows what will happen this year?

We learned that the more successful venues were where we did the Road Show in conjunction with the local SBE and/or SMPTE Chapter/Section and never do a show on a Friday. If you’d like us to visit your area, work with your Chapter and/or Section; let us know as we’re putting our schedule together now.

We’ll leave our home/offices here in Florence, OR on April 28th and will travel south through California, then head east along the southern part of the country. We’ll head up the east coast, after Florida, and plan to be in New England sometime in early to mid June. We’ll then begin heading for the west coast across the northern part of the country. We’ll jog up-into or down-into the heartland venues from which ever route is closest. We hope to finish off sometime in August.

It is not always possible for us to hold the Road Show on the same days you hold your local meetings, so we need your flexibility to be able to keep the Road Show schedule. We have no problem holding the Road Show in conjunction with any other local activities, so long as we can expose the most engineers to the technology we’ll be bring with us. Please keep in mind: this is an educational effort, not a sales shot.

We’ll be adding a new wrinkle to the Road Show: We’ll be meeting with the SURVIVORS of the broadcast industry, our dear follow members of the Order of the Iron Test Pattern, as we across the country. That, within itself, should be a lot of fun and we’re looking forward to it.

We’re starting to create the new pages for the website, but they won’t be up for another week or two, so please contact us so we can include you in this effort.

Tech-Notes – Taste of NAB 2004 Road Show

1980 25^th St.

Florence, OR 97439-9717

(541) 902-2424 Office

(541) 503-217-0712 Fax

E-Mail: Info@Tech-Notes.TV

 

As a member of both the Society of Broadcast Engineers (SBE) and the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) I have notified the SBE and SMPTE chapter and section chairs of this educational opportunity and many have responded very favorably. In some venues, A Taste of NAB will be their monthly program. If you are not a member of one of these organizations, you are still invited to attend. Membership applications will be available, should you be interested.

 

A Taste of NAB road show’s national sponsorship is fairly well fixed. We will be bringing with us some of the products and services of the folks listed on the Road Show's main page.

 

If you are an individual, you can participate by attending. If you are a company, you can participate on a local partnership basis. The national sponsors know that some of the local partners may wish to show competing goods and services or even show up to help support our sponsor's efforts. That’s they way it was at NAB2002. In that spirit, you are invited to join with me in making this educational opportunity a very big success and possibly reaping some benefits as well.

 

It makes little difference weather your station, network or facility is a member of NAB or not, the experience and potential for the interchange of ideas and technologies doesn’t happen anywhere else on this scale and it’s a crying shame to miss the opportunity. Not getting some exposure would be like taking the bean-counter’s calculators away from them – now there’s an idea. 

 

Tech-Notes has put together this Taste of NAB  “road show” in an effort to afford those who couldn’t make it to Las Vegas an opportunity to see and hear some of those services and products that were there in their own backyard. The response to this idea, to date, has been very positive.  If the engineers can’t make it to NAB, then the products and services at NAB should go to them! Obviously we’ll not take the place of NAB, but we can bring a part of it with us. Our van isn't that big, but something is better than nothing. Our sponsors have promised that their local reps will be present in many of the venues to assist in answering questions. For those engineers who are able to make it to NAB this year, the trip will serve to be reinforcement of what they saw. 

 

Why me and Tech-Notes? Many engineers know me through Broadcast Engineering magazine over the past several years, and through other writing efforts such as the Tech-Notes. This will be a two way street: I'll also get the opportunity to meet and speak with many of my peers, to hear their stories and share some of NAB with them.

 

Jim Mendrala will be keeping the home fires burning and be with us in spirit, while Fred Lawrence and I relish this opportunity to meet you all. 

 

Let's do it!

 

If you need more information, please contact me: Larry@Tech-Notes.TV.  The trip starts on April 22nd. Not all venues are carved in stone, as yet. 

 

Larry Bloomfield, KA6UTC

1980 25th Street
Florence, OR 97439-9717

 

(541) 902-2424 – Home/Office

(541) 999-1863 – Cell

 

Publisher: Tech-Notes

http://www.Tech-Notes.TV
A Taste of NAB Road Show host