RIT on TV News: Inauguration Web Traffic

WROC-TV (Channel 8) reports on the huge spike in Internet usage by members of the RIT campus community Jan. 20 to view President Obama's inauguration.

"If I didn't watch it online, I probably wouldn't have watched it at all," says Josh Gilpatrick.

"Most people I know watched it online because that was the easiest thing for them," says Chris Cascioli.

Tuesday's historic inauguration of President Obama caused an technological stir at a school known for technology. RIT's Greg Gardner is one of the people that maintains their computer networks. He couldn't believe what he saw.

"Normally they run somewhere between 400 and 500 megabit, during the inauguration it was close to 800."

That's almost double the normal Web traffic at RIT. "It certainly was unusual to have it go on for this amount of time," says Gardner.

Gardner says he's only seen it happen a couple times before. But there's no reason to panic or make changes. "Honestly we are adding more bandwidth on a regular basis. Its something we do on a regular review on to make sure that we have enough. At this time, I think we have appropriate amount."

While the rise in users on Inauguration Day didn't the computer systems to crash, it does signal a change in habits. "Nowadays people watch TV on the Internet. So it is a sign of the times," says Gardner.

"I have a feeling we are moving towards that Obviously most people still have TVs. So if there is one that is accessible they can do that but we sorta of live and breathe on computers these days," says Chris Cascioli.

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