Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Hybrid community meetings?

[Glen Ecklund (glen.ecklund]

> What are people doing about in-person vs hybrid vs zoom meetings?

I recently did the tech for a successful hybrid in-person & Zoom meeting.

You need one computer/device with a live mic and speaker connected to Zoom.
 I will call this the Zoom Audio Computer. Any other computers/devices in
the room should be muted, because a speaker and a mic on different
computers can cause echo and/or feedback.

I used 2 different speakers.  I will call the first one the *mic
speaker. *Hand-held
or other secondary mics are amplified by this speaker, so that everyone in
the room can hear each participant in the room. The *mic speaker* is
also placed near the Zoom Audio Computer's mic, so that Zoom participants
can hear. We used a small PA system that came with 2 wireless mics. I
positioned it 6 feet from the mic on the Zoom Audio Computer. We met in a
large room with 26 people spread out.

If everyone in the room can hear each other, and can be heard by the Zoom
Audio Computer's mic, you don't need a *mic speaker*. If you have 6-10
people around a table, a conference room mic connected to the Zoom Audio
Computer might enable remote participants to hear everyone.

The other speaker is the *Zoom speaker*. It can be just the speaker on the Zoom
Audio Computer, or an external speaker connected to the Zoom Audio
Computer, if you need more volume to fill the room.

Be sure you can select the appropriate mic and speaker devices on the Zoom
Audio Computer. If you have an external mic and an external Zoom Speaker,
and plan to use the same 3.5mm headphone jack for both, you might need a
mic/headphone splitter. I have not tested this. I used my laptop's built-in
mic and an external Zoom Speaker.

We had a 2nd laptop for the presenter.  It was only used for video--the mic
and speakers were muted. For video of individual in-person participants, we
used a cell phone connected to Zoom, also muted.  We used hand-held
wireless mics connected to the mic speaker. We did have a minor complaint:
when a person was talking into the mic and monitoring their image on the
cell phone, other people in the room felt that the person was not talking
to the other people, but to the phone.

One more optional thing:  We used an external camera on the Zoom Audio
Computer, aimed at most of the participants in the room.

One other problem with this scheme:  Since all of the audio in the room
goes to Zoom via the Zoom Audio Computer, that's the image that Zoom
highlights as the person speaking. If you have not-too-many Zoom
participants, this might be OK, using Gallery View.  Otherwise, you might
need to spotlight the actual speaker's video.

Sorry for the previous premature SEND.

*Glen Ecklund*
Arboretum Cohousing, Madison, WI