It's sad that Discovery Education as made a wreck of unitedstreaming.

Posts: 4
Location:
Joined: 2008-01-01

Reading this forum I see I'm not the only one experiencing frustrations with Discovery Education's poor handling of this product. I also see DE isn't responding any better to other customers' concerns than they do to mine.

unitedstreaming was such a great product. Even Digital Curriculum that DE bought up was better than DEstreaming. I wish there was an existing alternative to DEstreaming. Instead, they've tried to effectively corner the market and ruined the product in the process.

If anyone has found an alternative to DEstreaming I'd love to hear it. I'm ready to make recommendations to my district that we find an alternative and dump DEstreaming. It's not a good value; our district is just wasting money on this product.

Submitted by Modron on Fri, 11/07/2008 - 2:56am.

mantzd

Posts: 22
Location: Kansas
Joined: 2007-09-28

I am sorry to hear your

I am sorry to hear your frustration and anger with DE Streaming. Maybe I can help. What issues are you having with it? I have not experienced any issues here or heard of any from other school districts that I communicate with on a regular basis. Dean Mantz USD376, Sterling, Kansas STAR DE and Kansas Leadership Team Member

Dean Mantz

USD376, Sterling, Kansas

STAR DE and Kansas Leadership Team Member

Fri, 11/07/2008 - 8:15am

Modron

Posts: 4
Location:
Joined: 2008-01-01

I would be happy for you to

I would be happy for you to make the segments appear in the proper order in a video. When are you going to make that happen?

I have read comments similar to mine on the forum and I am aware I am not alone in my assesment that this product is not of the high quality it used to be. I believe one poster stated it "IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT!" However, it is "broke. In the past I've been a fairly frequent user of unitedstreaming and have attempted to make the best of DEstreaming, and I know the difference between the two. DEstreaming is not as good a product as unitedstreaming. I believe it's a poor product for our district and I believe we should stop wasting our money on it.

Until an alternative appears, which I intend to make happen, I will slog through what DE has to offer.

Fri, 11/07/2008 - 11:41am

ldaughrity

Posts: 2
Location: Texas
Joined: 2007-11-06

I am sorry to hear you are

I am sorry to hear you are so upset about DE Streaming. I hope that you will post more about your concerns so that those of us who do use it on a regular basis could guide you through the issues you are having. Please feel free to contact me or any of the Star Discovery Educators to ask questions or just to vent. We would be more than happy to talk you through whatever issues you may have with Streaming or the other Discovery Products.

Fri, 11/07/2008 - 8:56am

Modron

Posts: 4
Location:
Joined: 2008-01-01

I so appreciate your offer

I so appreciate your offer of "guidance." I can't tell you how much I look forward to being "guided" through the frustration of videos that won't stream even after I've spoken personally to DEstreaming technicians who have assured me they will do their best to have the problem resolved within 72 hours. Well, that was two weeks ago and the video still doesn't stream.

I am aware that one of the mysterious and wonderful qualities of "guidance" is that because of it the PBS video Liberty! The American Revolution: Are We to Be a Nation? is going to stream now! In fact, I'm going to go right now to that video and download it because I know guidance is going to make it stream. I just know it will.

Thank you ever so much for your guidance.

Fri, 11/07/2008 - 11:51am

jendorman

Posts: 7
Location: Pennsylvania
Joined:

I haven't encountered issues

I haven't encountered issues with video segments playing out of order, but my district did have some issues with streaming and downloading at the start of the school year. The issues had to do with our district filter and way that data was being cached. Our network manager contacted Discovery and the issue was resolved by changing a setting on our filter. I have read on the forum that this was a issue with other districts as well and was especially a problem for districts that host the Discovery content on their local servers. If you host content locally it could impact your ability to stream and download even when you are accessing the service from home. I have also read that others were successful when they forced their browser to load the newest version of the page by using Ctrl>F5.

Are you the network manager for your district? Is that why you are personally speaking with Discovery technicians? If not, perhaps your network manager should contact Discovery directly to review your district's filter settings. It might help resolve your streaming and downloading issues.

If you think of it, can you post the titles of videos whose segments are playing out of order?

Thanks.

Jennifer Carrier Dorman

Sun, 11/09/2008 - 12:03pm

kristine.shih

Posts: 7
Location:
Joined: 2008-06-20

Modron – I am sorry that

Modron – I am sorry that you are having trouble using the search function within DE streaming. Over the past few years, we have added thousands of videos to the site. Discovery Education updates the content library each month to ensure that our customers have access to current materials and resources. However, these additions will affect your search results due to the vast amount of videos available, especially if you are using generic keywords. I suggest using specific keywords to help narrow the search results. The Advanced Search will allow you to search by subject and grade.

I understand that you are also having trouble playing the video titled: Liberty! The American Revolution: Are We to Be a Nation? We are aware of the video issue and sorry for any inconvenience that this may have caused. In the meantime, we are going to remove this video from the site until the issue has been resolved to avoid further confusion. If you are having trouble streaming or downloading other videos, please contact the Customer & Technical Support Team so that we can help troubleshoot the issues you are experiencing.

Please note that Discovery Education periodically updates the site to enhance user experiences. These changes are in response to user feedback. Navigation of the site has improved over the past few years and we hope that you are able to see the benefits of the changes that we have made thus far.

* * *
Kristine Shih
Manager, Customer and Technical Support
Discovery Education
800-323-9084

Mon, 11/10/2008 - 11:21am

allisonbakken

Posts: 4
Location: Montana
Joined: 2008-01-24

Modron, I am sorry that you

Modron,

I am sorry that you feel this way. I have found that DE is much more than streaming videos, that is what makes it such a special product for educators. I encourage you to directly email your Discovery Education Network Manager. You might want to also check the title of your post.

Allison Bakken

5th grade teacher

Montana

http://blog.discoveryeducation.com/allisonbakken/

Allison Bakken

5th grade teacher

Montana

Sun, 11/09/2008 - 8:57pm