Last week I started a very high flight overview of several free versions of conference and meeting applications that can be used with your browser. As I said then, some of them also have apps for PCs, Macs and phones. This is a general discussion with links so if you have a need you may try them out and see which is best for you. Last week we started with Facebook Messenger and then Google Hangouts. Today we start with the one that started all the others, Skype.
How about Skype? Everyone has probably heard of it. I believe this is because Skype preceded most of those available today and set the standard. You can use the web version by going to Web.Skype.com. Skype also has apps for almost all devices. However, my experience with Skype has never been fantastic. I have had many dropped calls, some general failures and I have found if you have much over 10-12 people at a time you have issues hearing people clearly. Skype says that the free version supports up to 25 people on a call. It has most of the features Messenger and Hangouts do. I have not used it in over a year. You may love it and find it the best but that is my experience.
It just so happens the last one I have for you today is also my favorite for several reasons. ZOOM Cloud Meetings (zoom.us) has been very dependable and has many features. Now many of you will not need them all and since there are many features it will appear to be more complicated than some of the others I have mentioned. Unless you have a slightly "geeky" side you may not wish to try Zoom. However, in my opinion, it is a great one. It allows local recordings and multiple video guests. Others do this, too, but for some reason it just seems smoother to me with Zoom. This is important to me in that when I start my podcast, yes, you heard it here first, I will be able to do good interviews using Zoom.
I have listed them all in alphabetical order; however, I would like to give an honorable mention to one my friends, John, just introduced me to Honorable mention to UberConference.com. I have used it and like it but not enough to recommend totally since I have only tried it a few times. However, it does offer background music while you are waiting for a meeting to begin. I like that. It is much better than silence.
Keep in mind the free versions of all of these FREE conference and meeting applications have limitations. It may be that they limit the length of meetings you may have, the number of people you may have in one meeting, a limit to the number of meetings you may have per month and even video/audio quality restrictions.
But for normal everyday use here are my final thoughts.
- The easiest to use is Facebook Messenger with Google Hangouts being a close second.
- Most dependable performance is Zoom with Messenger and Hangouts in second place.
Try them all and see what you think. Do not hesitate to contact me with your findings or if you have another one you prefer which I did not mention. There are many of them out there.
