Club Meetings via Videoconference

[Bett]

Hi Mike
I have download zoom and tried it out with the help of my granddaughter,
It says that a fee of £11.99 required is for meetings over 40 minutes is this correct

[Mike Farley]

It says that a fee of £11.99 required is for meetings over 40 minutes is this correct

Yes and no. For 1-2-1 video conferences between two people, there is no time limit for the free version. The 40 minute restriction applies only to videoconferences where there are three or more participating, as will be the case for our meetings. Only the person hosting the meeting has to pay for the upgrade and the cost will be met by the club. In fact, it is not even necessary to have a Zoom account to take part in meetings, although it does make participation a little easier.

How are you finding Zoom?

[Bett]

Oh Wow thats great thanks Mike

[Laura]

Brilliant idea, I have been using ZOOM with a number of people and it seems very easy to use.

[Mike Farley]

We had a successful test this evening, with 24 people participating. There will be a second test at the same time tomorrow evening (Tuesday, 31 March). If anyone has any comments, post them here.

Did anybody try to connect but not get in?

[Mike Farley]

I have received a suggestion following yesterday's test that we hold VC meetings during the Covid-19 outbreak, not necessarily always with a schedule devised beforehand, but simply as an opportunity for members to get together. I am informed that people enjoyed chatting to each other before I joined in, having spent the first quarter of an hour or so self-isolating in a meeting all on my own*. Which proved the value of running a test beforehand for everyone to gain experience. It would have been even more embarrassing had I made the same mistake on the night of the competition.

There will be another test meeting this evening to which everyone will be invited if they want to hangout, whether or not they participated in last night's VC. As a result of receiving the feedback above, I plan to set up a "Croydon CC Chillout" on 8 April for people to have a natter, share photographs or anything else. There will be no formal agenda. If that works out, we can make it a regular event.

We have a good entry for tomorrow night's DPI competition. It should be an enjoyable evening.

* Well, you can't be too careful in the current situation .........

[Bett]

Mike I will keep it simple THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR DOING

[Iggy]

Bett said:
THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR DOING

I would like to echo what Bett has said.

Yes we did have a good time having a chat before the main agenda yesterday.

Perhaps on the days that the print competition are due, or any other Wednesday evening, members could show perhaps 2 or 3 of their images and chat about them.
It might be more organised to submit them through PhotoEntry.

Stay Safe,
Iggy

[Peter Boughton]

Did anybody try to connect but not get in?

The web client got part-way through then failed without error (even after relaxing security plugins).

However, it looks like Zoom has an option to record meetings and share the resulting video file with users - if that's possible with the club's account, it would still allow seeing all the images & hearing the judge's remarks.

https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/205347605

[Mike Farley]

Did anybody try to connect but not get in?

The web client got part-way through then failed without error (even after relaxing security plugins).

Confirmation, if any were needed, of our club's recommendation to use the Zoom client software for the best experience.

However, it looks like Zoom has an option to record meetings and share the resulting video file with users - if that's possible with the club's account, it would still allow seeing all the images & hearing the judge's remarks.

https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/205347605

As part of the Pro package to which the club subscribes, 1 GB of Cloud storage is included. That sounds a lot, but video can consume a lot of disk space. If we exceed the limit, the club will be charged for the additional storage used. Given that the meeting tomorrow could be up to two hours in duration, that might well happen. There is a function to record meetings onto the computer's local hard drive and I will experiment with that tonight. The solution might be to hold any recordings on the club's existing hosting service. Peter, of course, is best placed to advise about that.