Jan 19, 2009 08:40 PM
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Wondering how you're going to watch the inauguration of Barack Obama while at work tomorrow? Thanks to Lifehacker, we now have the rundown on ways to watch/stay updated without ever leaving our desks.
First, the vital info. The actual swearing in ceremony takes place at 11:30am EST and will go for about two hours.. There are lots more options listed on Lifehacker, but these are the ones that are probably most worthy of your time.
Live Streaming Feeds
If you don't have access to a TV, but don't have to worry about the corporate gestapo monitoring your every web movement, live streams of the inauguration are probably the way to go—and they're plentiful. From the sounds of it, there are two good choices:
• Live Senate Feed: The Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies' stream is about as official as it gets, with not only the live inauguration available, but also clips to past inaugurations and an overload of supplementary content on anything tangentially related to the event.
• CNN/Facebook: There was nothing more quality/entertaining/ridiculous than CNN's coverage of live events during the 2008 Presidential Campaign (pundit debate scorecards, holographic projections, Toobs!) and from the sounds of it, the CNN/Facebook live inauguration feed will be no different. You log into Facebook direct from CNN's live site, watch the inauguration, and watch your friends' status updates in real-time.
• There's also Hulu, but they're streaming the network which shall not be named.
Non-video Web 2.0 Updates
• InaugurationReport.com: If you can't get away with video at your desk, but can hide some text/photo updates behind a tab, you might want to consider InaugurationReport.com, which takes all the citizen generated content from Twitter, Flickr, YouTube and SMS, then aggregates it all on one page. It's your one stop shop for quick desk updates.
Mobile Web
If you do suffer the misfortune of being under heavy surveillance, then your only option left is to consider a new job grab your iPhone/G1, fake a lengthy trip to the bathroom, and use one of these services from the comfort of your stall:
• Ustream on iPhone: Ustream promises to stream the inauguration to your iPhone using their fancy new app...IF it manages to get approved by Apple before tomorrow. And considering that's a big if, I wouldn't place all your inauguration viewing hopes and dreams behind this.
• Inauguration Report on iPhone and Android: Inauguration Report also has free iPhone and Android apps where you can not only take in all the same content as the desktop client, but you can also provide live updates if you have any. However, seeing as you've resorted to hiding in a bathroom stall, I doubt you'll have any.
And as I've already mentioned, you can get the whole laundry list of online Inauguration offerings over on [Lifehacker].
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