MAJOR EDUCATION, E-LEARNING AND RESEARCH CONCERNS ADOPT GTV’S SONORK EIM INSTANT MESSAGING AND COLLABORATIVE INFORMATION MANAGEMENT SOLUTION

Sonork EIM Powering Presence-Based Messaging and Collaboration Networks To Unite Geographically Dispersed Students, Educators, Researchers and Doctors

NEW YORK – JULY 1, 2003 – GTV, a leading provider of Enterprise Instant Messaging (EIM) and Collaborative Information Management solutions, today announced details of Sonork EIM deployments in the education, e-learning and research markets.

Major educational and research organizations now relying on Sonork EIM to power educator, student and researcher collaboration include: The Center for Distance Education at Athabasca University, (home of The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning), and The Visible Embryo Project (participants include Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, Eolas Technologies Inc., George Mason University, Johns Hopkins University Medical School, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Oregon Health & Science University, San Diego Supercomputer Center, and University of Illinois at Chicago).

GTV’s Sonork EIM is the most reliable, extensible, feature-rich enterprise instant messaging solution on the market, enabling rapid deployment of presence-based messaging, localization, and collaborative networks within a secure environment. The solution significantly improves workflow by seamlessly integrating with existing data sources and third-party application suites, and can be tailored with custom applications for each customer. Sonork EIM communications are archivable for accurate record-keeping, while its secure peer-to-peer data transfer reduces email server costs and is scalable for future information transfer needs. Sonork EIM’s robust server boasts an extremely small footprint and is installed behind a customer’s firewall, supporting both intranet and extranet configurations.

“Digital platforms promise to transform the way educators, researchers and corporations communicate. Such products as GTV's Sonork EIM can lay the foundation for delivering a wide array of applications that incorporate all types of valuable data including text, Web content, and multimedia – powering a new generation of instantaneous, rich communications,” said Steven Vonder Haar, Media Analyst, Interactive Media Strategies.

Ken Mayer, Chairman and CEO, GTV, said: “With our entry into the education and research space, Sonork EIM demonstrates how the possibilities are truly endless for Instant Messaging to positively affect society. The power of Instant Messaging can unite teachers with their students, researchers with key data and doctors with patients, as Sonork EIM drives more effective collaboration.”

THE VISIBLE EMBRYO PROJECT AND SONORK EIM
The Visible Embryo Project, which is funded by the National Library of Medicine, is focused on demonstrating how leading-edge information technologies in computation, visualization, collaboration, and networking can expand capabilities in science and medicine for developmental studies, clinical work and teaching. Project participants include researchers and doctors at Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, Eolas Technologies Inc., George Mason University, Johns Hopkins University Medical School, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Oregon Health & Science University, San Diego Supercomputer Center, and University of Illinois at Chicago.

As such, GTV’s Sonork EIM is a perfect application with which project participants can instantly communicate and share vital information, as they strive to visually map out human embryo organ system development so that a geographically dispersed group of physicians can simultaneously examine, manipulate, and discuss key data. Indeed, Sonork EIM is one cog in a key medical project that looks forward to a near-future when it will be possible to draw on contributions to medical analysis and diagnosis by experts who may be in different cities, states or even countries…far from a patient's location (and from each other).

“Sonork EIM has become a crucial tool upon which Visual Embryo Project researchers rely, as they collaborate to annotate scientific images. We trust in Sonork’s stability and security for critical presence-based communications and file transfer,” said Michael Doyle, Ph.D., Eolas Technologies Inc. / American Registry of Pathology.

The Visible Embryo Project is part of the Next Generation Internet Initiative and is funded by the National Library of Medicine, which is part of the National Institutes of Health.

THE CENTER FOR DISTANCE EDUCATION AT ATHABASCA UNIVERSITY AND SONORK EIM
The Center for Distance Education at Athabasca University - Canada's Open University - has begun to deploy Sonork EIM for use in its classes where students are located throughout the world, with a high concentration in Canada. The Sonork EIM client is particularly well-suited to this use, due to the small footprint required for deployment on student computers – an obvious advantage for those with low-end user machines.

Moreover, since all teacher-student communications are media-based (with over 90% of such information transfer occurring online), Sonork EIM is distinguished as a convenient and easy-to-use method of maintaining contact and sharing study materials. Key to this effort is Sonork EIM’s unique capability for online and offline file and message transfer – enabling teachers to send messages and materials to students via Instant Messaging, regardless of whether or not a student is online…with all materials delivered the next time a student logs-on.

“Sonork EIM fulfills good use in my teaching and course work, in its convenience and ease-of-use for students, as it is accessible to teachers and students who possess both high and low levels of computer technology sophistication,” said Jon Baggaley, Professor of Educational Technology, Athabasca University.

The Center is home to The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning (www.irrodl.org), with over 5,000 subscribers and 100 editors. This prestigious online journal is focused on advancing research, theory and best practices in open and distance learning worldwide. Sonork EIM has been highly recommended in the objective comparisons of software published in www.irrodl.org's Technical Reviews section, as a means of effective communication in distance education.

For more information about Sonork EIM, please visit www.sonork.com.

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About GTV

GTV is the leading provider of Enterprise Instant Messaging and Collaborative Information Management solutions. The company’s Sonork application platform enables rapid deployment of presence-based messaging, information transfer, and collaborative networks within a secure enterprise environment. GTV’s Sonork-powered solutions enable customers to create new areas of revenue, reduce costs and improve workflow. Over 5,000 businesses and government agencies worldwide are deploying GTV’s flagship Sonork-EIM product, including AT&T, EDS, Erickson Austria, Hewlett-Packard Asia-Pacific and many others. GTV also offers Global-IM (GIM) a suite of enterprise-grade, public network Instant Messaging products for private-label deployment of unique consumer marketing and commerce channels by major media and entertainment brands. For more information about the New York-based GTV, please visit www.gtv.com