Review: Verdict Plus

A collective groan can be heard from AV techs when the client organising that major conference you have booked to work on next week, starts talking about taking delegate voting data and presenting it on-screen. This often leads to loads of scribbling on bits of paper, rushed data entry, layout problems in Powerpoint and the resulting embarrassment due to typos.

On the horizon bringing some relief is the Verdict Plus (VP) interactive response system from Hitachi. Initially developed for classroom use, the VP system comprises a central workstation linked to multiple wireless handsets capable of recording audience reaction through a series of push button commands. Similar in size to a regular TV remote control, the handset has an intuitive button layout upon which respondents can enter alpha-numeric data or merely respond to yes/no, true/false questions. Colour-coding on the keypad can also make data entry simpler. The data is then collected and can be automatically displayed on the PC as pie, bar, graph charts or a number of other layout options.

“While our initial focus for the product was on use in the classroom, there has subsequently been significant interest from corporate boardrooms, especially in the way this system can be integrated into our Starboard product, an advanced interactive whiteboard,” said James Burke, Hitachi’s Starboard product specialist. “In the conference arena, there is an emphasis on gaining opinion and feedback from the audience, and engaging their attention in order to avoid ‘death by Powerpoint’. The Verdict system can be key to achieving this by having the audience’s responses integrated live into the presentation at it proceeds.”

Pie charts aside, a more appealing games-type representation of the data is also built into the software, where any quiz-like results can be depicted as vehicles on a race track. Using this feature in training and teaching environments, students can visualise their performance against other participants as if racing each other around the circuit. Conceivably, game-show type simulations could also be possible, using the handset as the contestant’s response ‘buzzer’.