Welcome to another episode of Tim and

Event Productions. My name is Tim Kay executive producer here at Argus HD an event AV and broadcast production company and with me of course, Tim Kerbavaz! Tim is the technical director of Talon AudioVisual. Tim. How are you? Tim, I'm doing great. It's casual Friday here for both of us. Both you took your jacket off and I put on a t-shirt. You know, it's just laying low hanging out, you know. I like that and you know, what else I like is that you and I we're getting these episodes back on track. So kudos to us. I think this new format is it's great, you know - audience, let us know what you think. Listener, let us know what you think. Is this are we on track? Are you enjoying the subject matter so far the changes in 2023? Tim! Let's not waste too much time. I want to actually jump right into this one because we speaking of directions are going with a new direction here. This is a case file here. Let's open this up. Let's become the AV detectives that you know, this this is almost a calling, we don't want to do this, but we just happen to have some insight and some information. What's going on? Did you say AV detectives Tim?? I like that. AV detectives ya see! We're on the case. Tim, let's get down to it. There was a little bit of a brouhaha on Twitter recently and I saw that actually you were part of the thread what's going on, Tim? I got sucked into this thread Tim someone on the internet was wrong about event production and I just couldn't stand this was a tweet and we'll show you this tweet here about CES in January and it was a blogger talking about the AMD keynote at CES where shocker, and much to the internet's dismay.. there was a Macbook! On the table! At the tech table! At an AMD event! What is going on in our world Tim? We need some civility and AV police on this right now. Okay, continue go on. So this tweet implies that AMD, the client, was using essentially a competitor's product to drive their keynote presentation at CES, and - By the way, Tim if I may because I get such pleasure in reading this. Yes, please do. Bruh. AMD is running their CES keynote on 14 inch MacBook Pros after roasting the M1 Pro. That's a lot to say that's a strong statement. That's a strong statement. And I understand the sentiment but I was frustrated with this for two reasons Tim this tweet and I responded in kind because I thought there were two issues with this tweet. One was the implication that the computers were provided by AMD, which is the first problem here. The second is that the implication this was somehow involved in actually presenting the screen content, which, I would argue it's not connected to the screen at all in any way shape or form. So in now In fairness to this tweet, does it imply that it's running the screen content or that it is let's see is just running part of their show? Sure, sure. It could be - I guess you can interpret the tweet to say it was running the show, but my implication - the way I read it was that it was somehow tied into the video system and in the conversation the tweet back and forth that I had with this poster, you know, there was this implication that it was somehow video related. Well you know, listen, a lot is written on Twitter right and that in and of itself, right that didn't really sort of catch our attention, but then I started getting news articles in my phone about this tweet, right? So case in point, here's an article that says, "While giving its presentation one eagle eyed individual spotted the company employed people using 14 inch MacBook Pros to show off the performance slide, the same machine featuring either the M1 Pro or the N1 Mac. The irony will certainly make some people laugh." That's when it started getting my attention. This is just one article that I saw, how many more of these articles existed right Tim? We have to dive into this. We do. And like I said, I mean, I think this is irking me, you know, like I mean like this idea, you know, someone is wrong on the internet Tim! It's misinformation. So my first look at this was like, oh this is running this presentation, which I think is it's not actually what he's trying to say at this but he's basically saying MacBooks are running CES. Sure. Sure. And so I think you know what we come down to here is you know, the

is this a computer provided by AMD right? I mean is this AMD running a presentation? And so - Tim? I'm so glad you asked that because Guess what I have prepared? What do you have prepared? Exhibit A, your honor. Oh show me! A PDF. A PDF! Are you entering this into the record here Tim? Exhibit A your honor, please take this layout. So what do we have here? So this by no means is the show that is taking place. But what this represents is a traditional show where most shows replicate this formula - And I should say Tim, to our viewers. We were not there, neither of us were at CES this year. We weren't involved in this production. So a lot of this is us making inferences based on a traditional show setup. But this layout you're showing us is indeed a traditional show setup. It's one that actually you and I have done together several times with this exact this exact setup. And and so tell me what is this layout showing us about this implication that this computer is involved in running the show? Absolutely. So if we go now to what is called the front of house, the front of house is where the audience enters, thus, the front of the house. And so you can't see it made out here but from our experience and talking to the audio person, the audio in this layout is front of house center, but because that audio board did not meet the specifications of the show, we actually brought in another audio board which you will find house left. When you walk in, look to your left. That's house left. So you can see audio actually in a similar place to where the tweet post. So now we know okay this show matches a traditional layout because we don't see based on this picture the graphics department. We don't see the video department. Tim, where might those folks be? I feel like we're gonna harken to The Wizard of Oz here this "Pay no attention to the graphics tech behind the curtain!" Where is graphics where is graphics in a traditional show set up Tim? It's behind. It's behind the curtain and this is a strategically placed behind the curtain and I'll tell you why. Because oftentimes, you know, you're building this show out of a semi out of a box truck. You're connecting all the cables. You're putting everything together. There's a lot of wires and your engineering you want to keep it as close as possible for this so graphics and Engineering are usually very very close because they have the most amount of connections possible. Another reason why is because you're gonna have the client's handlers, the the producers for the clients come in give you updates for slide give you updates for content while the show is taking place. This is nothing but a major distraction if the audience is watching this while it's happening. Which is why you have primary graphics and backup, why you have a B- deck and backup so you can hop between the two. So what we're saying is what we're seeing is not a graphics machine. Right. What do you think it is then Tim? What's what's what is this? So this is clearly in my view the audio station in some of the other pictures this person tweeted there was clearly the audio console. There's clearly, you know, audio playback and to that point this person does show pictures of other Apple made computers that are clearly running - He doubled down by the way, two more Macs. This guy can find a Mac in a darkened room no problem. And I can say that those Macs sitting on top of the audio console are involved in the show, right? They're running playback. They're running, you know, there's like a Spotify account open Apple music or something playing background music and so I would say to be fair. Yes. Those are involved in the show, but I would say they're not running the keynote which is the implication here they're playing MP3 files right? This computer in particular that in the original tweet, to me.. It's sitting next to an empty dinner plate. Right? Like there's clearly like a plate with a napkin on top like this this person at this computer has just finished their meal, right? I'm looking at this and saying "This is a technician's personal laptop." Right? Like they're they're looking at a spreadsheet or something. They're like, you know looking at frequency coordination tables are looking at the run of show. Like it's just somebody's personal computer. That's just sitting there on the table. Like it's not it's not hooked up to anything and that the original tweeter says, "Oh, you know, it's plugged into a monitor." It's like right he wanted more screen real estate, he or she wanted more screen real estate, right? Like it's it's just a computer that someone's working on and so that's - So let's, let's talk about that more because you talked about frequencies you talked about, you know, what an audio person might be using their computer for right so and sometimes you know, and we talked about this offline right? Sometimes those are only for Macs or sometimes they're only for PCs depending on the application that's being run, right? Totally and I think what we're talking about like when I say this is someone's personal computer right when when you work on shows like this, right? There's lots of different players involved and ultimately the people sitting in the chair at front of house are freelance technicians who come with their own tools, right? And so in this case, you know an audio engineer is gonna come with their own computers particularly with the specialty software that they're familiar with, the software that runs the wireless system, the software that runs the intercom system, the software that tunes the PA and runs the EQ, you know control software, management software. And they're connecting, you know their own personal, you know documents together, you know linking and then viewing like the show documents that you know that the show management have created. So there's a lot of stuff that happens in the computer that people have built up software packages and have licenses for software on their own personal computers and they're bringing their computer. That's the value! That's the value of that technician that they bring that a production company probably doesn't want to own

production companies don't- most production companies don't have a in-house A1 I would say for big shows like this. Most of them are freelancers. Well and we talk about- we can talk about that a little bit with- a production company might have like an audio department head, so to speak right? So in a production company, they might have employees, direct employees who run, you know, the video department the audio department, right, who are their in-house team that build up, you know, design systems and manage things but the technicians on a show almost anywhere are gonna be freelancers because you know- Or part of a union, depending on the venue. Totally, totally, but you know, the events world is is I mean we talk about sort of often as the original gig economy right that like, you know, we have just like theater, just like cinema, right? We have a contingent workforce in our industry. And so people go from show to show to show from company to company and particularly when you're talking about big events like CES where these technicians are gonna be some of the best technicians in the industry working this event and they're working for some of the biggest production companies in the industry. You know, these are people who are at the top of their game and are really bouncing between show to show to show they're working the biggest shows for the biggest companies, but they're kind of working for all of them, right, and so they come to the show with a great deal of knowledge and a great deal of you know, tools and technologies that they've built up in their own personal libraries of software that they're bringing to the show. And so they've got that on their own personal computer, right? Correct. There's many layers of of difference between when AMD reaches out and then eventually to a show day. There's multiple layers, multiple agencies, multiple production companies and you're right like when we speak with, you know, sometimes when we speak direct with the client, or maybe we don't even speak- our bigger shows like this. We oftentimes don't speak to the client, we speak to the agency and our simple question is you know, what are the decks that are coming in? Right. You know, is it going to be run on Keynote or is it going to be run on PowerPoint? Then that drives our decision of what you know, whether we bring PCs or Macs because we're device agnostic when we come to a show. We just want to use the system that we know that's gonna work and and I can tell you if I was on this show, I would bring my best tool that I knew and trusted that has been battle tested for like at least a year before going on to such a major event like this. Totally. And I've actually been on shows where we've been told to to cover logos. That is actually pretty common. That's super common and you know, and I know you have your Argus HD sticker on that laptop there, but I literally have a black, you know, full laptop skin on all of my Apple computers because I just want it from the back to just be a black laptop. I don't want it to be obvious to a client walking by what kind of tools we're using. Are you saying we're not in the computer creation business here Tim? Are you saying that this is not an Argus built PC? Maybe it is. I mean- I'm gonna tweet at you now. Okay tweet at me. Call me out. Call me out. But I think that you know, certainly that that trend of of you know, you're putting your logo on it and I think a lot of people are just putting stickers to cover manufacturer logos because you know, the reality is that in the event space we work for lots of people lots of different companies often who are competitors of each other and and on one hand one of our clients is maybe directly competing with another and so our job in the event space is to come in Put the best show that we can put on. Put our best foot forward and and really I mean ultimately to blend into the curtains. And so we talk about the graphics and video teams sitting behind the curtain. It's because we want that portion of the event to be invisible. We want the audience to be focused on what's on the screen not what's sitting on the table and I think when we think about, you know, the reasons that this picture was taken, audio has to be in the audience because they have to be able to hear what the audience is hearing, right? You can't you can't mix the show very easily from backstage and certainly clients ask us to but you know, we try not to. Correct. Oh, yes, they ask and sometimes you know, like the asks that we get and we're like, "I don't I don't know if I can execute that ask at the level that you are hiring me to deliver at so let me make a modification and then I'll own it, right if it works great and if it fails and it's on me," and I make those decisions. Almost- I'll communicate that to the best of my ability with the client, but sometimes you know, like I know my tools and I know what they're asking for and I know how to get us there and that's essentially why you're bringing me out to the job. But you know, we should also show here is what a typical backstage graphics set up looks like and Tim. This is the show that you and I just did recently a couple months ago and you can see just the amount of computers and another reason why that graphics is oftentimes backstage. Just look at how much real estate this is. Look how much cables- you do not want people walking by bumping this table, cable gets unplugged.. one little cable is gonna take you a half hour, 45 minutes to figure out what went wrong to track it down. You want to keep as many people away from this as possible. Totally and looking at this picture, right? We see there's multiple PCs, multiple Macs, different manufacturer computers lots of hardware, you know, again, it's the best tools for the job to meet the client's needs. One of the things that we can also say is that certainly, you know, we weren't there on the show. We don't know what specific computers were driving this show but on shows like this, there's often a media server, right? So it's not necessarily even just like a computer a laptop made by a traditional laptop manufacturer. Content driving these screens- There's often a combination of something like PowerPoint or Keynote but also something like Disguise or Millumin or you know Pixera, and there's a bunch of different, you know, industrial media servers, you know that are that are running on proprietary hardware/proprietary software. So, you know, ultimately- Connected to an E2- Exactly! To basically broadcast the system. So a lot of the stuff is is a lot more black box than just like a computer sitting on a table when you get to the big LED wall shows and so, you know, I think what it comes down to is- So do you feel- so do you feel confident in based on what we see that this is not a graphics? I'm I am very confident that this is not a graphics station. I'm very confident that this computer belongs to a technician and it's just like their computer. The original tweeter was correct. There is a MacBook that is there. But let's explain why that was there and what it's doing. Absolutely absolutely and I have one piece of evidence Tim that I would like to admit to the courtroom here. We have exhibit B? And I'm not gonna show you a physical manifestation of this. I'm just gonna recount my experience here. So this is a testimony I guess, not evidence, but after this sweet conversation that I had on Twitter with this thread this this debate about this computer. I woke up the next morning to a text message. And that text message said, it was from a friend of mine, and that text message said, quote, "I hear my laptop is trending on Twitter." Amazing! No way. So it turns out that this computer was indeed an audio engineer's personal computer because I know the audio engineer who it belongs to! What a small world. You actually got a tweet from the actual person- A text. like just an SMS. Excuse me, a text. Wow. And so- Listen, when we talk about people networking, let's talk about networking. We harp on that in so many episodes. Yeah network with folks. We try to do the same thing. But Tim even though we talk about it it still surprises me that- It's you know, Tim this industry is so small and I'm struck every day how small the industry is and it's even when you know, I see comments on our videos from people that I know that like, I didn't send the video to but I'm like, "Oh like hi. How did you find this?" You know, it's amazing to me how small how tight-knit and frankly how collaborative our industry is and I think when we talk about, you know things like this on the podcast, you know, we're sharing our experiences and certainly our experiences are our own and unique but it's really about creating starting those conversations, having those conversations in the industry with our colleagues. You know, how do we make the industry better? How do we share our you know professional success with other people? How do we help, you know grow the industry and and, you know, keep those networks thriving and working. Correct. That's amazing Tim. I mean I don't know about you, but I feel like we did a pretty good job on this one and the fact that you actually knew the person was. I mean talk about a small world. So Tim we've covered a lot of ground here. We've introduced some very compelling evidence if I do say so myself. What's our verdict?

Let the audience decide. You know what? We're just here to present it. We're just presenting exhibit. We have exhibit A, we have exhibit B, the article and exhibit C, the fact that you actually knew the technician. I'd say that's some pretty convincing evidence, but indeed what do you think? What what's the outcome of this case for of our audience? And and really like what is the right thing for us to do in these situations? Right? I mean, how do we as an industry make sure that audiences understand, you know, maybe not how the sausage is made, but just some fundamentals about the industry. And I think Tim it's education. It's shows like you and I well we can actually we take the time to actually go into this because the nuance of this is what we love to do. This is what we do day in and day out so, you know, great. At the end of the day Tim, you know, I think this tweet was a little tongue-in-cheek. I think that you know, ultimately they were just poking fun a little bit. But I think that you know in the grand scheme of things, you know having a message about you know, how events are made conveying to our audience to our clients' audiences, you know, the little bit of how the magic happens I think helps make everyone understand better. Correct. And hey, this is just more of what we want to do. So if there's anything else that is there any A/V controversy that exists? If there's more tweets out there that you would like us to investigate. Tim where do they reach us at here? What what's our socials? Yeah, we got some socials, we'll put them on the screen and then you can reach us by email at TIMS, T-I-M-S at Tim and Tim Talk dot com or you can leave a comment right here on either YouTube or on the podcast platform of choice and we look forward to hearing from you. Cool. And you know what and if there's a project that you're putting together and you want to know what the right equipment is or you want to bring one of us on both of us on? Fantastic! Reach out to us. We're here for you for the audience any of those questions. We love answering them. So with that and until, Tim, the next controversy on Twitter happens It was a pleasure talking with you. My name is Tim Kay. And I'm Tim Kerbavaz. And we talked! And we talked. Tim. I thought we said we were going to- give that one a pause. Space that out, breathing room.