What could be better
Yes, I know I sometimes sound like a Lotus zealot, but hey, why else would I stay up late writing about Lotus stuff or watching Lotus Webcasts in my free time? I do have some complaints about Webcasts, though, so I'll get them off my un-hairy Captain Kirk-like chest right now. Here's a description of some of the problems I had and some things that could be improved:

• Live demos are often very difficult to see. The video portion of the screen isn't resizable, so you can't make it bigger no matter what your bandwidth connection is. If the presenters could include some of the demos as ScreenCams in the future, it might help to lessen this drawback.

• The Auto Slide on/off feature is cool, but it didn't always work correctly for me. This is supposed to enable you to prevent the right-hand side of the screen from getting refreshed based on where the speaker is in their presentation.

• The slides sometimes lag behind the speaker's presentation, and some slides were different than the ones shown on the video due to the speaker having updated them.

• You can only go forward or backward in one-minute increments, and when you drag the control knob, you can't see where you are in the presentation until you let go of it.

Tips and tricks for using the Webcasts
The Webcasts are designed to be intuitive to use, but I've discovered a few things that might help you when you're viewing them:

• Click on the video itself to pause and resume playback instead of using the buttons. It makes it a lot easier to quickly pause and resume playback.

• Maximize the window with the Maximize button in the upper right-hand corner of the screen.

• You can advance the slides at will, so make the most of this feature and look ahead a few slides to make sure this is something you want to spend your time watching and learning.

• Make the most of exploring the links on the left-hand side of the screen directly below the video. This is a great chance to explore some of the subjects with more depth while you're listening to a Webcast.

• You might notice there aren't any forward or backward buttons to help you control Web navigation on the right-hand side of the screen. To overcome this, simply right-click, and you'll have the option of going either forward or backward if applicable.

• Use the highest possible connection you're able to sustain. Hopefully you've got a smokin' LAN at work and a DSL or cable modem at home. I was very satisfied viewing the Webcasts at 200K, but I know the video isn't as smooth to watch at lower bandwidths.

My wish list for future Webcasts
There are also some things on my wish list for future Webcasts. I think they've improved a lot since the first free previews of Lotusphere Europe 1999, but there's always room for even more improvement.