Talk:Web conferencing

Webinar?
Web conferencing is often used to describe the application-based approach to web communications - involving the download of an application by all parties - this type of communication allows partipants to view and share web pages and desktop applications. This works well for meetings with two or a few people involved. Whereas the Webinar is typically used to describe a combined live webcast and teleconference, which is accessed and made interactive through a webpage or series of webpages. This type of communication is more suitable for one-to-many people.

Webinar is a contraction of the terms "web" and "seminar" As such, a webinar is as different from a web conference as much (or as little) as a conference is different from a seminar. If all of the participants are expected to take part in a dialog, then it's a conference. If the event is primarily for information delivery with limited dialog then it is a webinar. Seminar type events that charge a fee of the attendees are always webinars.

The only practical difference between a webinar and a web conference is in the technology and the cost of an event. The method used to provide participants to engage in a dialog becomes the deciding factor. A full dialog between all participants requires two directional audio and video from each to each. This is the most costly and least often used type of web conference, mainly because of its complexity. Next is an audio conference with a primarily one directional web connection- this is the most common method used today. Finally, there is a web conference with streaming audio over the net. This provides only limited feedback from the audience with chat or email used to talk with the host. This final method is used often for training and is the least costly method alternative.

Where does Webinar fit in?

 * I would just like to comment that the contraction "webinar" is really unpleasant, and is sort of unnecessary, and I think that a grass roots effort should be made to remove this word from our language. What is wrong with calling something a "web seminar"? We don't call a web page a "wage" and we don't call a web-based application a "wapplication" and a web conference is not a "webference" ... why do we use this ugly word "webinar"? Just my two cents. 152.1.209.139 15:31, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree, I heard the word for the first time today and thought it was a joke. It's a ridiculous term. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.146.0.41 (talk) 14:43, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Who's afraid of friendly capitalism?
Is it okay for allconferenceservices.com to use Wikipedia to get to a financially fulfilling Google page rank? Is the homework they made by writing up the Advantages and Disadvantages Of Web Conferencing sufficient to gain them such a placement? What are the WP policies on supporting capitalism? :) --lynX

Yuo will need an article (notability must be proven or it will be deleted), reliable 3rd party references are required. The general public will determine relevancy. GaryECampbell (talk) 21:07, 29 June 2008 (UTC) Yes I also agree with this and we should stop using this type of breeding into language. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.224.235.50 (talk) 12:12, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

comparison
I think a comparison of the most important clients, such as ICQ, MSN, Skype, Adobe Acrobat Connect could be quite helpfull. The features and software license (Adobe: Price) could be mentioned as well.

Best regards, 83.219.98.91 23:43, 25 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I concur. Though obviously there are many more suitable clients for review, such as | WebTrain Web Conferencing with VoIP], LiveMeeting, NetMeeting and WebEx. 203.33.3.2 04:24, 14 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I disagree to the comment about examining products like MSN, ICQ, these are IM products, not web conferencing products, it's like comparing a calculator to a spreadsheet. Products like WebTrain, LiveMeeting and WebEx are reliable because they have redundent enterprise class scalable load balancing infrastructures suitable for business web conferencing. MSN/ICQ/SKYPE are fine for kids and family chats, some business text chat, but they are not reliable enough for business web conferencing.


 * Comparison Comment - To put together a complete matrix with a minimum of just 15 vendors and 50 comparison points, it would take at least a year of research. Each point from each vendor would need to be factually 3rd party verified to meet Wiki publication guidelines.  In regards to maintaining the article, each vendor would also need to be monitored for new releases of their product, and each point would need to be reconfirmed for each product update.  If vendors completed the points about themselves, the article must removed due to COI and self publishing policy.  For this specific market place, a comparison matrix worth more than jibberish would be unachievable to create, much less maintain. GaryECampbell (talk) 07:42, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Search engine for webinars
Hi there! ;-) I have read about webinars in the wiki. After that I try to find webinars that relates to my job. It was very tedious. Some days ago I have found search engine for webinars. The link is as follow: http://peelon.com/ I have added this info to the External links. Moderator deletes it. What you think this information is necessary? Can it be placed in the External links section?

Best regards Volodymyr —Preceding unsigned comment added by MyVolodymyr (talk • contribs) 12:08, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Standardization of "Conferencing" by IETF
To give the article more realistic meaning within the scope of solutions offered in 2011 (and earlier), I made changes. There are two technical factors as well, which are HTML 5.0 and the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Rather than refer to specific documents that are likely to be replaced, references will be revealed if oen looks at the IETF site. Simply using this search text "ietf conferencing", the first 5 results returned by a Google search supported this assertion. Alternatively, here is document from 2001 that provides the technical detail. This information isn't really suitable for WP but its existence does support my original premise. That is, the article content wasn't entirely accurate as it was, and it contained no citations. The IETF provides several current documents. Here is another from 2001 (ten years ago). It may provide more detail than necessary on WP, as a reference and is from the Columbia University website. http://www.cs.columbia.edu/sip/talks/sip-conferencing.pdf (June 2001)

Kernel.package (talk) 01:33, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Possible useful resource
A reader wrote into Wikimedia suggesting a site with useful information on webinars which may be helpful to editors and may be worth considering as a link. I haven't examined the contents but I'm posting the link here for editors to review.

Talk the Talk Webinar Terminology-- S Philbrick (Talk)  16:56, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Webinar
. Conor Thomas O&#39;G (talk) 20:29, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

So can anyone help me understand why the changes I made, having disclosed my paid contributor status,got deleted? Obviously my interest is in clarifying that several companies, including mine, offer "webinar" platforms as a distinct product, and I mentioned and linked competing products along with ours. Since there's like half a dozen companies selling dedicated, well-defined webinar options, how is that distinction not relevant to someone reading the page? Because some people don't like the portmanteau? The word exists because the thing it describes exists, and it's not the same thing as family cocktail hour on Zoom. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Conor Thomas O'G (talk • contribs) 15:46, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Update: according to the user who deleted it, my contributions were "opinion" and "editorializing." It is an objective fact that "webinar" products exist, and include the characteristics I described, despite the semantic confusion. "GoToWebinar" is a different product from "GoToMeeting," as "Zoom webinars" are a different product from "Zoom." The definition of "webinar" may be evolving, but that's no reason to pretend the term doesn't refer to something distinct because it doesn't suit a particular person's semantic whims. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Conor Thomas O'G (talk • contribs) 15:59, 13 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Content added to Wikipedia must be verifiable (WP:V) and cited to a reliable secondary source (WP:RS). So the analysis and commentary you added (in Wikipedia's voice) regarding classification debates, status of accepted definitions, common attributes, etc. would need to be summarized from an appropriate source, ideally a source that is not directly tied to hawking any one product. Some examples might be, , etc. - LuckyLouie (talk) 16:06, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Ok, so the only issue here is citation, then. It seems a little redundant, given the cited description of the classification debate in the paragraph that immediately precedes mine, but I appreciate you taking the time to give me examples. I'll put it back and include those. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Conor Thomas O'G (talk • contribs) 19:41, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
 * As mentioned above, the cited material should directly support the text being inserted. If your only objective is to get a link to your clients website into the text, you will run into problems. I’m not going to get into an edit war to prevent you from engaging in WP:PROMOTION, however there will be other experienced editors who will eventually come around to revert it. - LuckyLouie (talk) 19:53, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time to explain. Naturally my objective is totally to get the link, but there's no reason that can't happen in the context of genuinely meaningful and relevant info. The "web conferencing" page is behind the times right now, all promotion aside. There's nowhere for people to get an objective explanation as to what a webinar is, despite their objectively existing as a distinct thing. Thanks again, you've been helpful. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Conor Thomas O'G (talk • contribs) 13:11, 18 May 2020 (UTC)