Emergency Medical Services and Tim actually have more in common than even I thought. Let's talk about it. Hello everybody and welcome back to Tim

Event Productions. My name is Tim Kay executive producer of Argus HD we're an event AV and broadcast company and with me Tim Kerbavaz, a technical director of Talon Audio Visual. Tim, hello. How are you, sir? Hey Tim, it's great to be back with you here for another episode. Love it. I love that. You said it's good to be back because let's just jump right into this one. You were away. Where did you go Tim? Why did you go there? What did you learn? We promised the viewers- welcome viewer by the way. We appreciate you guys for tuning in and watching. We promised them that you know, we're gonna take them with us to where we go to these events and share what we know so Tim Don't hold back share with us. What do you got? So I was in Savannah, Georgia. And this was the first time that I have ever been to Savannah which was a lovely town really gorgeous a little rainy. It was beautiful by the way- There was a hurricane on the way, so- okay. You time 'em perfectly that's my timing. I'm like, but I was in Savannah for the Peplink User Summit. Now in the past episodes, we've talked about Peplink and the technology that I've invested heavily in it's a bonded cellular SD-WAN solution that allows you to combine multiple cell connections cell modems and multiple wired ISPs into one, you know, robust, you know connection that balances across all of the different different connections. And- Now what, Tim I'm gonna interrupt you because this is actually it's a really fantastic product. I was looking at also getting this while you were you know, while you're picking it up and really going deeper in the ecosystem. Where are these mainly deployed because this is not as common in AV maybe it's starting to become a little more, you know, we're seeing it more often on shows. So this is used in a lot of different places that are completely different industries from AV. It's used a lot in life safety and police cars and ambulances to connect, you know, the computers in those cars back to you know, the home office. It's used a lot in like portable medical offices or like buses or vans that are doing x-rays or sample collection or blood testing where they've got to upload a lot of data back to the hospital in real time. It's used, you know in places where internet service is unreliable where you maybe have, you know an okay connection on Verizon and an okay connection on AT&T, and you know, maybe you have an okay Starlink connection you're able to combine them together to make you know, a pretty good connection for your office internet or branch offices, you know things like, you know an office that that needs a reliability backup for credit card processing or something like that totally and you know, I think it's like we sometimes get into that into the headspace that well we think is probably the only industry that needs it. So it's really interesting to see how many use cases there are for the technology that that we think we have to be the number one client for that. Yeah, and really at this event, there was only one other person who worked in the video broadcast space right? And it was it was really interesting to hear all these different use cases from healthcare from you know, you know boating there were literally a bunch of marine users who are using this technology on like super yachts and like AI controlled sailboats things like that and really interesting different use cases, but it was great because this was actually a pretty intimate event. It was the inaugural conference of this of this series and it really gave me and this other colleague who was also in the video side a chance to ask him like really direct questions to literally the manufacturer the CEO of this company Zoomed in, you know from the head office to really explain how he was seeing the future of the products that he made and there was a bunch of some of the the biggest and and strongest users of this product all really talking about the ways that these this product can work and and some of the new technologies and and they were talking a lot about a new version of the firmware which I am still waiting for. They promised it would be released last year, it still has not been released. We'll send them this video. Maybe let's put a little pressure on them. But I'm really excited for some of the features in this new firmware and there are some features in the format that are really actually targeted exactly to our use case in broadcast. So let's talk about what do you- maybe not.. you could talk about the feature. But how is it going to help a production? How is it going to help a client? What is sort of the end goal of these future releases specifically for how we use it? Yeah, and you know, we've talked about in other episodes, how I've used this technology to livestream from places where there were internet issues or you know, unpredictable connection and that's really what this is all gonna make it easier to do, is in places where I'm walking in blind into a space that I haven't had a chance to do a site survey and I just need to be able to throw this box down turn on a modem on each of the major carriers and maybe I can plug into a connection. Maybe I can plug into Starlink, but really, you know, I'm coming in and have to be up and running really quickly. There's some new algorithms in the bonding ecosystem that are gonna allow it to better balance across different systems and really maximize the reliability specifically for live streaming. And for the viewers that are just tuning in and then haven't watched, the show that Tim is referring to is our 2022 recap. Well, we didn't go through everything. We just essentially went through some of our favorite episodes not necessarily the most technologically advanced one. And in that, Tim, you talked about the use case in detail, which was fantastic. A lot of great feedback from that. And in addition to that use case for the streaming and the you know, uplink in challenging locations, one of the other use cases of this technology is providing internet in maybe traditional venues, like hotels and convention centers where you know, we need connection whether that's to stream or whether it's just for for office use but the venue is going to charge an arm and a leg to get connected. Oh when you see the bill that some of these venues charge you'll really wonder how they come up with that number in today's era. Like they invented internet, they're making internet in the kitchen and they're serving it up to you on a fresh platter. It is unrealistic sometimes and you know like we run into this, Tim, right? Where you know, these solutions are great and it's really finding that use case where you know, you can provide that service for your live stream, but then it's like when the client says, "Oh, can you also provide it for all of our attendees?" That's where you got to pump the brakes a little bit. Totally, and with with the understanding that you know, this is still ultimately reliant on cell technology, and so, you know, it's certainly not guaranteed but you have a lot more robustness and reliability than just like a single hotspot on your phone or like, you know, a jetpack or something like that, you know- And one thing I will say, pardon interrupt you for the listener for the viewer here. Is if you have this technology and even if you do the walk through with your technology into the space just know when that room gets filled with folks, everybody's looking at cat videos on their phone looking at watching YouTube on you know, their laptops. It's a completely different network environment. So make sure you prepare for that caveat that you really- it's good to know that the signal reaches your device, but what is the real world implications when you have a thousand people in the room. Totally, and I would say, you know, it really makes sense to order that hardline, particularly if you have a really critical live stream of your general session, as much as I want to you know move these devices in my inventory, I think it's really important to recognize it as you said, there's limitations, you're still, you know, ultimately reliant on the cell network which indeed can get congested at really popular events. But one of the things that I think this offers is a really interesting opportunity even in events where you are gonna order a hard line is to provide that backup connection right? Where maybe the venue has really great internet. They have fiber to the building, but they only have one ISP. And often when we're live streaming we want to have separate redundant stream paths out of the building in case you know, the construction down the street cuts the fiber line and now you've suddenly lost your connection and so really one of the things this allows us to do is have really seamless instant failover across either one or more local hardline connections plus the cellular, plus other connections that you bring in and so I think that's really the beauty of this is it certainly never gonna replace fiber? I think I'd always rather have a fiber connection if possible but- Agreed. -this really good or options and reliability and certainly, you know, in many ways offers an alternative to like bringing a satellite truck which is going to be really cost prohibitive. This is really what this technology is replacing at the end of the day is it's a satellite truck replacement. Instead of having a satellite truck, you have a backpack. It's not your primary replacement. It's essentially another tool in your producers tool bag and you just said it perfectly there, Tim. So what you had you you've learned you the new features that you're excited about the new algorithm. You did networking. You met some new folks out there, you know, wh- anything else would you say that this was successful? Was it worth your time? I think it was a great conference. It was really exciting to, you know, be part of this inaugural event. As you said I met a bunch of people. Both other people working in the same space but also, you know, like I said working with the manufacturer with the managed service providers that I'm working with on these technologies deploying them and meeting, you know, my sales reps in person. They'd be like shake their hand and say, "Hey, I appreciate the work you've done, show me these products", you know, I ended up actually placing orders after the show for some more technology, more hardware, you know, and then the other thing that was really interesting about this is I was actually a double booked and I I got myself, you know, I needed to be in two places at once and so I was actually using this technology from my hotel room to remotely support a production in San Francisco at Moscone Center. At the same time I was in this hotel in you know, Savannah. That's amazing. And tell me, like that is exactly why you're investing the time, the research, and the expertise to be able to, "Hey, you know, I need you for a job, you know, Tim because what you do, I mean you're top of the game here with what you do in there." And so they want you- they knew you were at the conference, right? And you're like "Listen, I can do it. But just so you know, I'm doing it for my hotel room." Not a problem. Totally, and we talked about, you know, we've talked a lot about remote production. We've talked a lot about you know, your control room and studio and the possibilities that having, you know, remote technology enables and enables not only us to have cameras and control them in different places that allows us to have production teams spread out all over the world and supporting an event, you know really from you know, a global perspective. That's awesome. So Tim are you gonna go back next year? Is this something that's worth your time? Did it open up your eyes to potentially any other conferences or further education that you think would be, you know, applicable to you? Already bought my ticket, and next year they're gonna offer a certification course, which I'm signing myself up for. Amazing. Hey,

He wants certificate zero zero one, fresh off the press. Fresh off the press, exactly. Well, thanks Tim for these questions. I really appreciate that conversation about this, you know, really exciting technology and you know, the geekery that I get myself into here as you know, I'm a huge geek. We love it. This is- this is why our audience tunes in. I mean sure it's our jokes. Absolutely. Maybe not. It's absolutely not. But with that, hey, listen, thanks folks. We really appreciate you tuning in. We, listen- We also appreciate your questions. So please keep those coming. Also if you think that, you know, we might be a right fit for one of your projects coming in, reach out to us, it's Tim, I believe it's the Tim's? at the.. Tims, T-I-M-S at Tim and Tim talk dot com. Just one S. The last time I messed up as well, one S. Tims We'd love to hear from you. If we think- if we're a right fit for you, we'll let you know. If not, we can also refer. We have a great network that we reach out to. So thanks so much for tuning in. My name is Tim Kay. And I'm Tim Kerbavaz. Aaaaand? We talked! We talked. See you later! Tim we're supposed to do that together! We talked! Next time. Next episode.