I did some checking around on the ZDE platform. It’s apparently based on tools developed by Stream57. I spoke with them and they seem to have a lot experience with live webcasting. I also spoke with someone who has worked with them and they said they do a good job (maybe with a little lack of attention to detail, but nothing terrible).

Here’s the problem for business event producers:There are hundreds of companies now that can do a live video webcast. These companies typically aim at the high end: They bring in a full production crew and produce high-quality video content that cost tens of thousands of dollars. So now you’ve sunk a big dime producing content that goes out to desktops where everybody eats for free. How do you monetize that? What’s the business model? The sponsorship model only goes so far.

The nub of the problem seems to lie in this: Software Developers don’t produce events, and Event Producers don’t really understand software.

Full disclosure: My company is working on a new event model that takes on this problem. A lot of what I write about comes out of research that we’re doing to launch this model. I hope to write about it more specifically in the future. I’m posting here because I know a lot of event organizers are struggling with the same issues, and I’m hoping to share ideas.