Facebook. Online gaming. Surveillance. What do all of these things have in common?

The answer is the use of video compression. Upper School Linear Algebra students have recently been studying techniques and creating equations that are involved in video compression, and thus educator Lauren Shareshian decided to bring in a real-world authority on the subject.

Monday morning guest speaker Keith Wymbs visited Shareshian's class to dialogue with the students about this type of compression. Wymbs works for Elemental, which is a Portland-based software company recently acquired by Amazon. Together he and the students brainstormed some of the current uses for video compression and discussed what new ways to implement this technology might be on the horizon.