Neowin: Facebook enables live streaming from Messenger Rooms. “Earlier this year, Facebook introduced Messenger Rooms, a feature that allows up to 50 people to meet up online in a video conference. The tool is meant as a rival for platforms like Zoom, which saw a significant boom in popularity due to the global pandemic this year. The feature has been brought into Facebook’s multiple products, including Facebook proper, Messenger, and WhatsApp, but today, the company is adding Facebook Live integration as well.”
videoconferencing
Neowin: Skype 8.62 adds preset replaceable backgrounds on desktop, new grid view for video calls
Neowin: Skype 8.62 adds preset replaceable backgrounds on desktop, new grid view for video calls. “Microsoft is rolling out a new update for its Skype apps, just under one month after the last update was released. That update, version 8.61, replaced the React Native version of Skype that used to be available on the Microsoft Store with one based on Electron, similar to the desktop version you can find on the Skype website.”
MakeUseOf: The Best Way to Give a Keynote Presentation Over Zoom or Skype
MakeUseOf: The Best Way to Give a Keynote Presentation Over Zoom or Skype. “When working remotely, you may need to deliver a Keynote presentation over Zoom, Skype, or other video conferencing apps. This is daunting at first—especially if you aren’t tech savvy—but there are two simple methods you can use to do it. Keynote Live is the best option, which lets you share your presentation slides with anyone online. If that isn’t available, you can share your Mac screen over Zoom or Skype instead. We’ll explain each of these methods in more detail below.”
CNET: Rickroll service spices up Zoom meetings with Never Gonna Give You Up
CNET: Rickroll service spices up Zoom meetings with Never Gonna Give You Up. “Zoom fatigue is real. The coronavirus pandemic has pushed much of the world into endless loops of virtual meetings, but there is a light in the Zoom darkness. Creative technologist Matt Reed has created a Rickrolling service that summons Rick Astley and his catchy Never Gonna Give You Up hit into your Zoom meetings.”
PC Magazine: How to Use Facebook Messenger Rooms for Group Video Chats
PC Magazine: How to Use Facebook Messenger Rooms for Group Video Chats. “With Facebook Messenger Rooms, you can create a virtual room where people can come by and spend time with you on video. Your room can stay up all the time, or you can open it for specific occasions like a happy hour, game night, or birthday party. Open the room to all your Facebook friends or just invite specific people. Messenger Rooms works on the Facebook and Messenger websites or app. Unfortunately, only Chrome and Edge web browsers are supported.”
Neowin: Google Meet to add 49-user tiled layout, background blur, and more for education users
Neowin: Google Meet to add 49-user tiled layout, background blur, and more for education users. “Google is announcing a few new features for Meet that will roll out later this year, which are mainly geared towards G Suite education customers. The new features include added capabilities for admins and moderators, the ability to replace or blur backgrounds, larger tiled view to accommodate more participants in a video call, and more.”
Mashable: Sick of Zoom? Here are 8 other video conferencing options to try.
Mashable: Sick of Zoom? Here are 8 other video conferencing options to try.. “Whether you’re looking to video chat with your friends and family regularly, or if you’re simply looking for a visual calling solution for your company, a video conferencing system is a must. Audio phone calls are increasingly out of fashion because who doesn’t want to see the reaction on a loved one’s face? Or be able to discuss more accurately a vital business matter with potential clients? With the urge to work remotely ever-growing, it’s particularly crucial for small businesses to take advantage of video calls, but really, we can all benefit from it. Find out the best video conferencing software for your needs here, and just why specific solutions are better than others, depending on your situation.”
BetaNews: You need to take action if you want to avoid being cut off from Zoom
BetaNews: You need to take action if you want to avoid being cut off from Zoom. “Zoom 5.0 came out of Zoom’s 90-day focus on security updates, and one of the key improvements was the addition of GCM encryption. But to take advantage of this security feature, and others, people need to be using the latest version of the software. As such, it is important that you update your Zoom client, or you risk being cut out of meetings completely.”
‘Zoom fatigue’ is setting in: What it is and how to prevent it (CBC)
CBC: ‘Zoom fatigue’ is setting in: What it is and how to prevent it. “Although the term may not be found in psychology textbooks, some psychologists say the condition has become all too common in the COVID-19 era, with so many people working from home and holding meetings through video conferencing applications such as Skype, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet or Cisco Webex. The fatigue can stem from any such software.”
The Cut: How to Make a Realistic Duplicate of Your Head and Face (for Zoom)
The Cut: How to Make a Realistic Duplicate of Your Head and Face (for Zoom). “Wouldn’t you love a guilt-free break from Zooming? Try to imagine it. The ability to have a single night’s relief from screaming into a computer during an ultimately dispiriting facsimile of a ‘hang-out’ with your friends or loved ones, without the stigma that accompanies turning down the invitation. The ability to act as a sounding board for your in-laws’ thoughts about lifting isolation restrictions, without having to be a sounding board for your in-laws’ thoughts about lifting isolation restrictions. The ability to present an attentive audience for your boss during a ‘meeting,’ while you just close your eyes or lie on the ground or do literally anything else, for the love of God. Believe me when I tell you: I can bring you this relief.”
The Verge: Anchor will now let you make video calls into audio podcasts
The Verge: Anchor will now let you make video calls into audio podcasts. “Anchor, a podcast-making app owned by Spotify, will now let you take recordings of your video calls and chats and turn them into podcasts (via TechCrunch). If you’ve been doing a regular Zoom meetup with your friends to talk about Animal Crossing: New Horizons town designs, for example, this new tool could help you turn those conversations into a podcast you can publish and share.”
FBI: FBI Warns of Child Sexual Abuse Material Being Displayed During Zoom Meetings
FBI: FBI Warns of Child Sexual Abuse Material Being Displayed During Zoom Meetings. “The COVID-19 crisis has caused many organizations and schools to conduct virtual meetings/events, some of which are open to the public. Additionally, links to many virtual events are being shared online, resulting in a lack of vetting of approved participants. During the last few months, the FBI has received more than 195 reports of incidents throughout the United States and in other countries in which a Zoom participant was able to broadcast a video depicting child sexual abuse material (CSAM). The FBI considers this activity to be a violent crime, as every time child sexual abuse material is viewed, the depicted child is re-victimized. Furthermore, anyone who inadvertently sees child sexual abuse material depicted during a virtual event is potentially a victim as well.”
New York Times: Son Stabs Father 15 Times on Zoom Call, Killing Him, Prosecutors Say
New York Times: Son Stabs Father 15 Times on Zoom Call, Killing Him, Prosecutors Say. “A 32-year-old Long Island man was arrested and charged with murder on Thursday after fatally stabbing his father more than a dozen times while he was on a Zoom video chat with about 20 people, the authorities said. The father, Dwight Powers, 72, had been participating in the Zoom call at his home on Dixon Avenue in Amityville, N.Y., when he was attacked by his son Thomas Scully-Powers, just after noon on Thursday, the Suffolk County Police Department said.”
Lifehacker: Use These Extensions To Trick Out Google Meet
Lifehacker: Use These Extensions To Trick Out Google Meet. “Google Meet is now free for everyone to use. The search giant has finished its rollout, and anyone with an email address—a Gmail address, that is—can use it to hold free video chats. Meet isn’t as fully-featured as other video chat apps, but a few useful browser extensions can add in much-needed functionality. Oh, and they’re free, too.”
Virtual Meetings Help Overcome Social Distance; Spatial Makes Platform Accessible For All With Free Service (PR Newswire) (PRESS RELEASE)
PR Newswire: Virtual Meetings Help Overcome Social Distance; Spatial Makes Platform Accessible For All With Free Service (PRESS RELEASE). “Spatial, the leading VR/AR collaboration platform that allows people to work over distance as if in the same room, today announced that in response to the Coronavirus pandemic, it’s opening up unlimited access to its premium services to everyone free of charge, for the coming months. In addition to access via major headsets, Spatial can now be used by the masses via a web version on your desktop or iPhone/Android, allowing anyone to enter a Spatial AR/VR meeting by simply clicking on a meeting link – no downloads required. The company is also announcing a much-improved experience and general availability of Spatial on the leading all-in-one VR headset today, Oculus Quest, previously only available in private beta.”
