Some of you may have heard that Deke Decosta has retired from Harvard employment with effect from April 30, 2005. His presence will be missed. However, as we move forward, it also provides an opportunity to review the delivery of media services to DEAS. We are working with FAS on this, and in the interim, while we go through this exercise, we have put in place an arrangement where IT will provide some of the services and FAS Media services will provide the rest.

Please see the use cases given below along with the contact for that category of service. This new arrangement will be open to the community with effect from May 9, 2005. Note that as of that date, the Facilities office (Jason Ortega) will no longer be responsible for loan of AV equipment. That function has been transferred to the IT help desk where you may walk in during office hours and check out equipment contingent to their availability.

Contact options for faculty and members of the community that will be available starting Monday May 9, 2005:

1. Loan of AV equipment for classroom or conference room use during normal office hours -* IT Help Desk, Rm No. G107, MD

2. Reporting of technical problems with AV equipment in classrooms with mounted AV equipment or in conference rooms using checked out equipment during a class/meeting :
   1. During normal office hours: IT Help Desk -- they will provide initial technical troubleshooting services; if correcting the problem requires more specialized technicians, IT will call FAS Media services, however keep in mind that if the turn-around time is too high then the faculty member concerned will need to make a call on whether to continue the meeting with or without such equipment; Note that FAS Media Services are ultimately responsible for mounted classroom equipment, and I am told that they have limtations in how much spare parts and bulbs they can stock; be alerted that service will be constrained by this factor)

   2. After regular hours: Call FAS Media Services at 5-9460; (service based on availability of technicians and spare parts)

3. Special Events:* FAS Media Services (ext. 5-9460)-- FAS provides fee for service support for seminars and conferences. They will need at least two weeks of advance notice; FAS provides, free of charge, video recording of course related events but they will need two weeks of notice in this case also.

Feel free to contact Chris Palmer, Manager of DEAS IT, Enterprise Computing Services ( palmer@eecs.harvard.edu; ext. 5-5780) if you have any further questions.