Conference: What is local government for?  Live streaming and live debate - visit www.bristol.gov.uk/localgovconference

Wednesday 15 May - start 09:10 to 17:00 - streaming all the keynote speeches and panel discussions

Webcasting facts and figures - how are we doing?

Like many UK councils, we webcast some of our most important council meetings. Since the project began in 2007, we have webcast more than 230 meetings. Our webcasts have received around 350,000 views from more than 120,000 unique visitors and 72,800 repeat visitors.

The majority of our audience watch our webcasts from our archive, however our most popular webcasts, such as election results and big planning applications, have attracted large live audience figures.

For example, our top 3 highest viewed webcasts (total views = live + archive views) are:

• Mayor of Bristol and PCC 2012, 16 November 2012: 23,606 total views
• Cabinet, 23 June 2011: 20,497
• City council election results 2011, 06 May 2011: 14,776

Our 3 least viewed webcasts (total views = live + archive views) are:

• Comprehensive Area Assessment seminar, 30 March 2009: 260 total views
• Overview and Scrutiny Management Committee, 29 July 2008: 289
• Resources Scrutiny Commission, 21 January 2013: 336

Many people are interested in local democracy and the issues that affect them but are unable to attend meetings; webcasting is one of a number of online engagement methods that enable local people to connect with their council, pariticipate in important decision making processes, and learn what is happening in their area.

What is a webcast?

A webcast is a transmission of audio and video over the Internet enabling you to watch council meetings live from the comfort of your own home on your PC or Apple Mac.  This service forms part of a wide range of tools to promote e-democracy in Bristol.

Using this microsite

Forthcoming and most recent webcasts are displayed on the right. Older webcasts can be found in the Webcast library.  All our webcasts should be archived within 2 working days and are available for 12 months after the event.

When watching check out any extra features that may be available such as slides, resources, speaker profiles and live text chat.  In an archived webcast, use the links in the timeline to jump to a specific agenda item or speaker.

Can't find a webcast?

Very occasionally, for technical reasons, we have to film a meeting offline and upload it to You Tube the following day.  The following meetings can therefore be found on our You Tube page:

Cabinet, Thursday, 20th December.
Resources Scrutiny Commission, Wednesday, 16th January.
Cabinet, Thursday, 28th December.

Sharing and embed features

Click the share button at the bottom of a webcast player page to share the short link via social media sites or email, or obtain the HTML code to embed the webcast on your own web site (N.B. wordpress.com sites won't allow embedding).

For a live webcast, these share features are available from the player page on the day of the webcast. For an archived webcast, you can also choose the point in the webcast at which you want the link or embed to start. This time facility can also be accessed from the webcast's timeline.

Having problems viewing?

See the Help section for information on technical specifications and troubleshooting.