Hi.TV: Video for Empowerment in the age of COVID-19

[Rob Monster]

@omelet and @epik finalized a partnership deal this week to develop the domain name Hi.TV into something that might serve humanity in a novel way. This comes at a time when many people find themselves isolated due to COVID-19 related quarantines. In short, it seemed to be a good time to introduce new solutions for hosting of virtual meetings, both public and private.

Epik is happy to introduce an instant-on video solution that allows anyone to connect with others around the world in a single click with no download. You can follow the progress here:

https://hi.tv/

You can set up your own meetings for free.

There is even an Epik meeting room that is open to the public to meet with whoever from Epik is around at any time -- employees, customers and partners:

https://hi.tv/Epik

Here is one for NamePros:

https://hi.tv/NamePros

If you are bored or just want to visit, you can come hang out or start your own rooms.

Let's see what innovation gets unleashed.

 

[HotKey]

Disappointed this has been placed under "promotional". Promoting what, communications under extra-ordinary circumstances? Even Jimmy Fallon is broadcasting from his basement.

How quick we are to judge, on predispositions. A better location would be under the "meetups" section, at least it's relevant.

Ok, back to trying to get that audio fixed. Juggling between getting the wife's washing machine fixed, throwing domains at marketplaces and audio working on my webcam now. Can we guess which takes precedent?

 

[Bob Hawkes]

It looks like a great service that will fit a definite need. As you note, @Rob Monster, a timely introduction.

Thanks for telling us about it. Glad to see that there is a NamePros meeting room.

Bob

 

[Rob Monster]

It looks like a great service that will fit a definite need. As you note, @Rob Monster, a timely introduction.

Thanks for telling us about it. Glad to see that there is a NamePros meeting room.

Bob

Thanks Bob. And thanks for the Tweet.

What is cool is that the idea was conceived yesterday. We had a deal on the table to develop Hi.Tv. Along comes the Corona Virus quarantine life and clearly there is a need:

- Homeschooling
- Support groups
- Music lessons
- Live performances
- Worship and Prayer meetings
- Industry meetups

The list is pretty endless, and we'll just look forward to seeing folks being empowered to do novel things that would otherwise happen face to face, etc.

Thanks to one of our engineers, Austin Gillman, bringing this initiative and just getting it done. I call guys like Austin and @Gube "Mega Stack" developers as "Full Stack" is not sufficient.

@Gube is now working on a Zendesk replacement for the domain anme CustomerSupport.Co. We hope to put that online shortly, and will start using it across the Epik ecosystem.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

The list is pretty endless, and we'll just look forward to seeing folks being empowered to do novel things that would otherwise happen face to face, etc.

Have you considered using it for domain name discussions and negotiation? Someone sees a name with an Epik lander. They can click somewhere saying they would like to discuss it with a seller in a private meeting. The seller gets a notice and the two get together to discuss concerns, questions, price, etc?

Bob

 

[omelet]

As you can see, when push comes to shove, or when duty calls, we just get it done.

My wife said she loves this very much.0_o

 

[Rob Monster]

Hey Nic, I'm just going to chime in, from personal experience with the service thus far (also @Bob Hawkes ):

Used it this weekend for first time with multiple family members spread out across the province, a total of 5 families on at the same time. It was awesome!

- the room is avail to anyone once there is no one else left using it. So for example, the minute you leave the room opens up again. This is great, it will prevent hoarding of easy to remember names.
- the person who first creates the room becomes the moderator, and can set the password. In the same regard, if the mod leaves the room but there are still others in the room, then moderator status get moved to the next person whom last joined the room, and so on and so forth.
- the password once set, is required by anyone who wishes to join the room.
- Bob, I had one family member who also couldn't use Safari. I confirmed this by installing an older version of Safari onto my desktop, and it didn't work for me either. Same thing, a blank/dark screen. So basically just got the family member to download and install Chrome, and viola.

Not sure what people who don't have the ability to download/install an alternate browser will do, such as for an iPad device, but maybe they'll change compatibility in the future. Could be an issue with Apple devices being so proprietary when it comes to security.

Take it ease!

Thanks @HotKey.

The engineering team met this morning to map out some related projects. One of the things is coming is an option for a permanent video address, e.g. hi.tv/hotkey. That will not be free but it will be a private meeting room forever. In the meantime, the names do expire.

We do have a capable product manager who is working on video sharding for being able to provide a massively scalable video performance. There is some higher expense associated with that infrastructure investment. The paid rooms should make that a sustainable business model.

 

[Pay.My.id]

Congrat's Rob for delivering new video service,

 

[Rob Monster]

The next step is to add the ability to stand up custom domains including virtual TLDs for Hi.TV, e.g.. Pay.Hi.TV which works like a domain name on Epik and accessible via API.

 

[Lox]

Brilliant Nice @omelet and @epik ! When partnerships work, everybody happy.

 

[Rob Monster]

So, like instant video-conferencing? Good stuff, thank you, sir! And omelet

Amazing the fruits a good domain name can produce.

Yup, instant video conference. No download required. No signup. Just visit and go. Free.

 

[Rob Monster]

Disappointed this has been placed under "promotional". Promoting what, communications under extra-ordinary circumstances? Even Jimmy Fallon is broadcasting from his basement.

How quick we are to judge, on predispositions. A better location would be under the "meetups" section, at least it's relevant.

Ok, back to trying to get that audio fixed. Juggling between getting the wife's washing machine fixed, throwing domains at marketplaces and audio working on my webcam now. Can we guess which takes precedent?

 

[omelet]

hallelujah! @Rob Monster

 

[Rob Monster]

hallelujah! @Rob Monster

As you can see, when push comes to shove, or when duty calls, we just get it done.

 

[Rob Monster]

My wife said she loves this very much.0_o

Earlier today several Epik team members were in the Hi.Tv channel for Epik and a bunch of the spouses said Hi to each other. Many of them had never met each other before but because everyone is working from home now, it just happens organically. Spouses, dogs, cats, etc. It is all fair game now.

 

[equity78]

Rob love seeing a .tv being used especially a two letter, can you tell me how this compares to using Zoom? Thank you.

 

[HotKey]

Have others got it to work with iOS devices? May just be that my device and IOS it supports are not the latest, but if I enter hi.tv on Safari on an iPad shows secure site but just dark screen.
Bob

So, 2 questions:
- If you name a channel is that then available to you for x years to come - i.e. every time you want a video chat with someone you tell them to go to hi.tv/nictraders (for example) and that room will always be available to me?
- And if you set a password that password is required for any participant to enter, then off we go?...

Thanks.

Hey Nic, I'm just going to chime in, from personal experience with the service thus far (also @Bob Hawkes ):

Used it this weekend for first time with multiple family members spread out across the province, a total of 5 families on at the same time. It was awesome!

- the room is avail to anyone once there is no one else left using it. So for example, the minute you leave the room opens up again. This is great, it will prevent hoarding of easy to remember names.
- the person who first creates the room becomes the moderator, and can set the password. In the same regard, if the mod leaves the room but there are still others in the room, then moderator status get moved to the next person whom last joined the room, and so on and so forth.
- the password once set, is required by anyone who wishes to join the room.
- Bob, I had one family member who also couldn't use Safari. I confirmed this by installing an older version of Safari onto my desktop, and it didn't work for me either. Same thing, a blank/dark screen. So basically just got the family member to download and install Chrome, and viola.

Not sure what people who don't have the ability to download/install an alternate browser will do, such as for an iPad device, but maybe they'll change compatibility in the future. Could be an issue with Apple devices being so proprietary when it comes to security.

Take it ease!

 

[Lox]

1. Disappointed this has been placed under "promotional". Promoting what, communications under extra-ordinary circumstances? Even Jimmy Fallon is broadcasting from his basement.

How quick we are to judge, on predispositions. A better location would be under the "meetups" section, at least it's relevant.

2. Ok, back to trying to get that audio fixed. Juggling between getting the wife's washing machine fixed, throwing domains at marketplaces and audio working on my webcam now. Can we guess which takes precedent?

1. agree
2. browser settings or mic permission / privacy settings

 

[omelet]

Earlier today several Epik team members were in the Hi.Tv channel for Epik and a bunch of the spouses said Hi to each other. Many of them had never met each other before but because everyone is working from home now, it just happens organically. Spouses, dogs, cats, etc. It is all fair game now.

 

[HotKey]

Have you considered using it for domain name discussions and negotiation? Someone sees a name with an Epik lander. They can click somewhere saying they would like to discuss it with a seller in a private meeting. The seller gets a notice and the two get together to discuss concerns, questions, price, etc?
Bob

Nice. Add a tab to a lander ie "Meet the Seller", an agreed upon time between the two and viola. Just a click away for both. Can see scheduling times within a room, ie the Namepros room, being integrated, like a pop-up calendar showing 15 minute blocks being avail to book or not.

At this stage easy to use and completely functional. I think this is going be a valuable collaboration tool for investors, and the other collaborative areas Rob mentioned. Bringing awesomeness.

2. browser settings or mic permission / privacy settings

Thanks, that's exactly what it was. Ran into Intelliname, pleasure to meet. Great guy. Lot of hard work going on behind the scenes!

 

[Rob Monster]

Nice. Add a tab to a lander ie "Meet the Seller", an agreed upon time between the two and viola. Just a click away for both. Can see scheduling times within a room, ie the Namepros room, being integrated, like a pop-up calendar showing 15 minute blocks being avail to book or not.

At this stage easy to use and completely functional. I think this is going be a valuable collaboration tool for investors, and the other collaborative areas Rob mentioned. Bringing awesomeness.

Thanks, that's exactly what it was. Ran into Intelliname, pleasure to meet. Great guy. Lot of hard work going on behind the scenes!

Thanks @HotKey.

Sorry I missed that. I have become a big fan of @Intelliname. Turns out we were in the Epik Hi.Tv channel for a bit tonight actually due to the need for some screen-sharing.

We have also been doing a daily prayer meeting in the mornings. I am looking at extending this Hi.Tv to help folks whose church communities mayhave been broken up by ongoing quarantine.

 

[Kassey Lee]

Grat idea, Rob. How about setting up a weekly calendar and have some volunteers (the pros) take up time slots of, say, 60 minutes, so investors can come and discuss a specific issue and ask questions?

 

[Rob Monster]

Rob love seeing a .tv being used especially a two letter, can you tell me how this compares to using Zoom? Thank you.

It is comparable to Zoom.

Where we differ from Zoom:

- No logging or surveillance of meetings

- Up to 1000 users in a meeting for free

- Branded URLs, e.g. hi.tv/raymond

- Ability to deploy on stand-alone domains, e.g. Raymond.Tv.

 

[equity78]

It is comparable to Zoom.

Where we differ from Zoom:

- No logging or surveillance of meetings

- Up to 1000 users in a meeting for free

- Branded URLs, e.g. hi.tv/raymond

- Ability to deploy on stand-alone domains, e.g. Raymond.Tv.

Cool thank you and @Lox pointed out to me Zoom's privacy policy

 

[Rob Monster]

In good company. Great to meet you yesterday Rob.

If you get an opportunity, go fool around with it guys if you haven't already- great spot to chill too. Kids and all. Pick a room and off to the races.

btw, if you run into Rob, he only goes by Mr. Monster. Else you get banned.. just an fyi. Just trying to help the situation.

Take it easy.

That's hilarious Truth be told, @HotKey addressed me as "Mr Monster" and I said "Call me Rob". So much for that myth of formality. We had a good time visiting with Hotkey's family.