NEW YORK (Oct. 25, 2000) – WeMedia Inc., exclusive rights holder for international Webcasting and US rights holder for television coverage of the Sydney 2000 Paralympic Games, will begin its milestone coverage of the event with the Opening Ceremony on October 18 and continue through the Closing Ceremony on October 29 in what is being hailed as the most ambitious sports Webcast ever staged on the Internet.
The Paralympic Games – the second-largest sporting event in the world – have been held "parallel" to each Summer Olympic Games since 1960; presenting world class athletic competition for athletes with disabilities.
Viewers will have simultaneous access to information and breaking news on athletes, venues and events. To make the Webcast accessible to the largest audience, two versions of the event have been designed; one developed exclusively using Flash, and another using standard HTML and images for people who use accessible technologies or have slower Internet connections.
"What we are doing is truly convergent. The content you will find in our interactive offering is far more than timely statistics and a video stream. We will have interactive content streaming in real-time from our broadcast center in Sydney accompanying the different live streams," said Jason Alan Snyder, Vice President and Creative Director of Media Convergence and Experience at WeMedia.
"We are setting the standard by which Webcast events will be measured – this is the yardstick for a convergent media experience using the best technology currently available," Snyder said.
The media-enhanced site incorporates some of the most cutting-edge technology available, including Macromedia's newly released Flash 5. The HTML site has built in frames, and is accessible to screen readers with alternate text for graphical and navigational images. The WeMedia Convergence and Experience team has collaborated with Smashing Ideas of Seattle, REZN8 of Los Angeles and Yahoo to create this Web experience.
Snyder and his nine-member team led by Editorial Director, Jade Lynam and Design Director, Warren Park have been working on similar projects drawing on their combined experience since 1993. The team includes collective expertise in areas such as motion picture production, traditional advertising, television and radio broadcast production, corporate and consumer branding and identification, eCRM, e-commerce, print and interactive creative ideation, design and execution, editorial content auditing and journalism.
In addition to continuous live video coverage on www.wemedia.com, WeMedia will produce daily highlight and feature programming on both Fox Sports Net and PAX Television, with a two-hour CBS wrap-up special scheduled for December 31.
Rick Gentile, Senior Vice President, will serve as Executive Producer of WeMedia's broadcast coverage. Gentile is a 10-time Emmy award winner who produced three Winter Olympic Games for CBS and the 1996 Paralympic Games in Atlanta. He is joined by Jay Rosenstein, also a veteran of CBS Sports, and WeMedia's Vice President of Programming, and Arthur Pincus, formerly of the New York Times, Washington Post, and the National Hockey League, who is Vice President of Content.
WeMedia Inc. is a leading media company founded by Cary Fields and Jerome Belson. The company launched We Magazine (now WeMedia magazine) in 1997 and more recently introduced wemedia.com, offering news, information, products and services to people with disabilities, their families and friends.
Cary Fields, President and CEO of WeMedia said, "When we started WeMedia, our vision was to create an unparalleled source of information and entertainment for the community of people with disabilities, their families and friends. Now, using convergent media, we are on the eve of accomplishing that vision in the most remarkable way possible."
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Contact WeMedia:
Arch Dumenigo, Editor, Convergence and Experience
130 William St.
New York, New York 10038
(646) 769-2744
(212) 931-6700, x.2744
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