Today might be the day television as we know it heads into a new dimension. 3D is gaining significant buzz with the release of Avatar in theaters this winter, and the momentum is bringing the technology into your living rooms. ESPN announced that they are going forward and launching a 3D TV network with plans to air a minimum of 85 live sporting events during its first year, starting with the 2010 World Cup this June.

ESPN has committed to the 3D network for one year. The sports network, owned by the Walt Disney Company, has been testing 3D for more than two years, even showing a USC vs. Ohio State college football game in select theaters.

But, ESPN isn’t the only one taking the big step.

The channel, which has an expected 2011 start date, will be a 24-hour channel broadcasting a variety of programming. The ESPN network will only operate during scheduled 3D broadcasts.

I can’t wait for Shark Week 3D!

Sports in 3D could be very interesting. To really achieve the desired effect, I imagine the camera positioning will have to change from your typical broadcast. Cameras will have to be immersed in the playing field, with people coming to and from the camera. A football soaring through the air into your living room could be a spectacular effect. A running back charging down the field, toward you could put you right in the game. You’d be that last DB, bracing for a tackle and then "BOOM!" a teammate comes out of nowhere to keep your bones intact.

When ESPN 3D goes on the air at the World Cup this year, how will we see the goals? Will there be a camera placed in the net? Will we still watch everything from the sidelines? and how will that affect the desired 3D effect? As the resident hockey fan, I have to ask how an NHL broadcast could even work in 3D.

In December 2009, The Dallas Cowboys partnered with HDlogix and brought fans the first ever 3D broadcast. The result: a demo that lasted only seven minutes. 80,000 people in attendance were given the glasses necessary to view the game in 3D and a majority of them didn’t even bother putting them on. Without the glasses, the image on the screen looked blurry - which fans booed loudly - and after only six minutes and fifty seconds the 3D broadcast was halted.

Many people know what 3D can do, but remember, everything in Avatar was strategically planned and manipulated over years of testing and developing the technology. 3D works very well with pre-produced programming and it could become the next great advancement in video games. How will the 3D technology translate to live broadcasts? I’m eager to find out. 

Let me clarify that I am a big fan of 3D technology. It serves its purpose in theaters, IMAX, and could be the next great tool in corporate communications. However, I am skeptical about 3D TV. I feel there are some drawbacks and the first that comes to mind is wearing the special glasses.

Two hours at a movie theater? No problem. Every time I walk into the living room? Not so sure. Lets not forget you’ll need a new 3D HDTV (or a conversion box), so the big screen you bought last week won’t work. Paying a premium for 3D on top of my monthly cable bill? No thanks.

As exciting as this is, lets not forget that it has taken years to get the majority of the public to make the switch to HDTV, which was the big talk of the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) just six years ago. When HDTV was unveiled, it changed the way we watched television. Now, the public is supposed to commit to another drastic change in broadcast television? As great as 3D is, it’s going to take just as long for the general public to be convinced as it did for HDTV; and by that time, there’ll be a newer, bigger, faster, better technology that will change the way we watch television...again.

Innovative interactive training program, "The Road to Safety," is a key element in RSC's overall initiative to minimize the company's OSHA incident rate.

Chicago, IL, December 9, 2009 – An innovative interactive training program designed and developed by Quicksilver Associates is contributing to an impressive industrial safety record at RSC Equipment Rental, one of North America’s largest rental providers. The number of reportable safety incidents at the company continues to trend down.

The program, The Road to Safety, is mandatory and has been completed by every RSC employee in North America. Using techniques familiar in online gaming, users navigate through a typical RSC facility and are challenged to identify safety hazards. Their overall score for the course partly reflects how many hazards they identify. Learning objectives are reinforced by on-screen guides who provide coaching and additional information, and by integrated testing.

RSC’s goal for its overall safety program is “no accidents.” The company is doing well, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) incident rate dropped 33% in 2008 over 2007. As of August 2009, RSC’s OSHA rate stood at 2.3, compared to a 5.8 rating at the start of its Delivering Safety First campaign in 2006.

 “The Road to Safety has helped us advance our safety goals, and continue building our safety culture,” said Ken Colonna, RSC’s Director of Safety. “It forces every person in the company to visually identify the common and not so common safety risks, and just as important, to be very clear about how they can help prevent them.”

The program is structured so that the user must either identify or review every safety risk that it illustrates. As employees proceed through the program their performance is continuously recorded by the company’s learning management system.

 “We set out to establish a new benchmark for safety training in our industry,” said Colonna, “and to demonstrate our safety commitment to our customers and employees. I think we’ve achieved that. The bonus is that it’s a very engaging program that has been well received. The scoring promotes friendly competition, which also seems to have reinforced the learning.”

To learn more about The Road to Safety and the underlying training platform, please visit www.quicksilvernow.com/InteractiveTraining.

About Quicksilver Associates, Inc.
Quicksilver Associates, Inc., a creative communications company based in Chicago, Illinois, designs, develops and delivers integrated communications solutions for corporations and organizations. Founded in 1976, we have partnered with hundreds of businesses, helping them to use the power of communications to more effectively connect with their important target audiences and achieve their business goals.

More information about our solutions and work history is available at www.quicksilvernow.com.

Quicksilver is a certified Women’s Business Enterprise.

About RSC Equipment Rental, Inc.
RSC Equipment Rental, based in Scottsdale, Arizona, is one of the largest equipment rental providers in North America, servicing the industrial, maintenance and non-residential construction markets with an original equipment fleet cost of $2.4 billion. RSC offers superior levels of equipment availability, reliability and 24x7 service to customers through an integrated network of 464 branch locations across 40 states in the United States and three provinces in Western Canada. Customer solutions to improve efficiency and reduce cost include the proprietary Total Control® rental management software, Mobile Tool Rooms™ and on-site rental locations. With 4,300 employees committed to safety and sustainability, RSC delivers the best value and industry-leading customer service. All information is as of September 30, 2009. Additional information about RSC is available at www.RSCrental.com.

For more information, contact:  

Michael O’Brien
(312) 943-7622 x117
mobrien@quicksilvernow.com

Heather Schlichting
(480) 905-3341
heather.schlichting@rscrental.com

Per Ohstrom
(480) 281-6934
per.ohstrom@rscrental.com

Released in 2001, Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) is a dinosaur in the browser world and it’s causing problems for users and web developers alike. Not surprising, then, that there is a growing campaign by some in the Internet community to get rid of it.

At eight years old, IE6 has problems adjusting to new Web programming languages and practices. For example, IE6 doesn’t support advanced CSS and XHTML, key tools of today’s Web developer. Designers and programmers who see their pages display beautifully in more modern browsers (IE7 & IE8, Firefox, Safari, Chrome and Opera) often have to spend hours programming hacks so that the pages also display correctly in IE6. “It’s like having to build a special rail track for older, out-of-date rail cars that are still in service,” says Quicksilver developer Lakshmi Jayaraman.

We know that IE6 will be phased out eventually – and because it restricts innovation in terms of layouts, display and interactivity, major players like Google, Facebook and YouTube are pushing for that to happen sooner rather than later. For example:

    •    Facebook provides a decidedly lesser experience for people using IE6, and also offers links to download more modern browsers

    •    IE6 doesn’t work well with Google Mail, and fails to run at all with some other Google products

    •    YouTube is gearing up to limit support for IE6.

As an aside, YouTube already demonstrated its clout by requiring Flash Player 9 for viewing all video content; this contributed heavily to users worldwide upgrading their computers to Flash Player 9 from older versions. Could a boycott of IE6 by leading technology companies lead to a similar scenario? We can certainly expect to see entities such as email providers, news sites, and development companies ending support for this browser before too long.

If this browser has so many limitations, why does it keep hanging on? There are a number of factors, including:

    •    15-20 percent of Internet users worldwide still use this browser as their primary window to the Web.

    •    Windows 2000 is not capable of running anything newer than IE6, and some businesses have not upgraded their computers to a newer operating system.

    •    There are businesses that have invested in custom applications that require IE6.

Despite these factors, the way to move IE6 towards the exit lies in the democratic nature of the Web – the fact that if enough people make similar choices, then the environment as a whole evolves in that direction. It’s likely that a lot of IE6 users don’t really think about upgrading their browser, and are not aware that their online experience could improve if they did. In fact, I saw a vox populi report on television recently where people on the street were asked, “What is a browser?” Fully 50 percent of those interviewed couldn’t answer the question.

All the more reason to push the alternatives – provide links to downloads of better browsers. We must get rid of the expectation that the Web experience should be the same for IE6 users as it is for those viewing the Web with better software.

However, if a site really must cater to IE6 because of who its audience is (and an analytics program perusing your web site logs can tell you what percentage of your visitors is using IE6), then you have a couple of choices:

    •    Accept the browser’s limitations, understanding which design elements and functionality will not display or work correctly. And communicate those limitations to your visitors. Provide them with links for upgrading, and tell them about the better experience that awaits.

    •    Plan to spend a little extra for programming hacks. 

Note that while some people can upgrade, a Digg survey found that 77% of the sample simply had no upgrade option. Of course, those with administrator rights to their PC's could always download Firefox or Chrome and do an A/B comparison test – which can be quite revealing!

If you think you can influence the remaining 23% in the Digg survey, then you may find this page useful – paste the code into your own site page to provide a visual link to downloads for four modern browsers. Or follow these links to upgrade to a modern browser:

Firefox
Internet Explorer 8
Safari
Google Chrome