More than one hundred thousand Church members, friends and invited guests are expected to attend the 178th Semiannual General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Millions more will watch or listen to conference proceedings via television, radio, satellite and Internet broadcasts. Five sessions of the conference will be held Saturday and Sunday, 4-5 October 2008, in the Conference Center in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Admission & Seating
Tickets are required for entrance to all five sessions in the Conference Center. Distribution of conference tickets to Church members is under the direction of local Church leaders. Conference Center doors will open 90 minutes prior to each session. Ticket holders should be in their seats at least 30 minutes before each session begins. Admission is limited to persons 8 years of age or older.
As a security precaution, everyone entering the Conference Center to attend any of the sessions on Saturday and Sunday will be required to pass through metal detectors and bag checks. Those attending are requested to arrive early to minimize delays. Cameras, recording devices, weapons, food, backpacks, packages and large bags will not be allowed in the Conference Center.
Overflow seating will be available in the Tabernacle, the North Visitors’ Center on Temple Square, the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and the Conference Center Theater (Priesthood and Sunday sessions only). Overflow seating for Spanish speakers will be provided in the Assembly Hall for all five sessions. Tickets are not required to enter overflow facilities.
Broadcast
General sessions can be viewed live on KSL-TV (channel 5). KBYU-TV (channel 11) will not air General Conference sessions live, rather, it will air the morning and afternoon sessions on both Saturday and Sunday on a 2-hour delayed basis in Utah.
Both morning and afternoon sessions on Saturday and Sunday, however, will air live on BYU Television, KBYU-HD, and KBYU-FM (89.1 & 89.5 in Utah, as well as on the Internet on BYU Radio and on BYU Radio on the Dish Network’s cd-audio channel 980).
BYU Television is available on most cable systems in Utah, and is available on over 250 cable systems throughout the United States as well as on the Dish Network, Channel 9403 and DirecTV, Channel 374.
BYU Television International will air morning and afternoon sessions of General Conference live in Spanish and Portuguese on Comcast in Utah. Also, BYU Television will stream morning and afternoon sessions of General Conference live at www.byu.tv and BYU Television International will stream morning and afternoon sessions live in Spanish and Portuguese at www.byutvint.org .
Audio of general sessions can be heard live on KSL Radio (frequencies 1160 AM and 102.7 FM). A full broadcast schedule including broadcasts in Spanish and Portuguese can be found at www.bonneville.info.
At least one session of conference will be provided to Church meetinghouses throughout the world via satellite and DVD. All sessions of conference will be televised to receiver-equipped sites via the Church satellite system of approximately 6,838 Church-owned receiving sites in 96 countries worldwide: United States and Canada 4,246 sites; Latin America and the Caribbean 1,650 sites in 32 countries; Europe and Southern Africa 518 sites in 37 countries; Asia and the Pacific Rim 424 sites in 25 countries.
American Sign Language (ASL) and English closed-captioning will be available in the Conference Center for deaf or hard-of-hearing individuals. All satellite and television broadcasts of General Conference in North America will be closed-captioned. ASL will be shown as a live stream on the Internet at www.lds.org/broadcast (except the priesthood session). ASL will also be broadcast live into meetinghouses where requested. All sessions in ASL will be on www.asl.lds.org 24 hours after the live session.
Church units in areas of the world where satellite and other transmissions are not available will receive DVDs or videotapes of conference sessions through Church distribution centers located in 30 international areas of the Church.
Internet Access
Live video streams of each session of conference (except the priesthood session) in English, Spanish, Portuguese and ASL will be available at https://www.lds.org/broadcast/gc/0,5161,8046,00.html. Video streams are available from LDS.org using a new Church media player, Windows Media stream or from www.byu.tv .
MP3 audio files in English and more than 30 other languages will be available within a week of the conference. Over 50 additional languages will be provided in MP3 audio by session within 4 weeks of the conference. English text of the conference talks will be published on www.lds.org within the week following conference; other languages will also be available within four weeks.
Article prepared by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Newsroom at www.lds.org and is used by permission.