I'm not a great fan of VoIP in busy offices or public places. Call me a throwback to the last century, but I feel a little uncomfortable shouting at a computer screen with a crowd of onlookers. Come to think of it, I don't like telephone conferences, either.
We've had the odd video iChat with a guest lecturer here at Ravensbourne - it's high risk, as the video doesn't always work (good old firewall traversal). But when it does all work, it works well, and is good, exhilirating fun.
I'm almost arguing against my point...
I prefer plain old text chat for synchronous communication. I have accounts with various IM networks - one can't seem to go through life these days without picking these things up - but I find XMPP (Jabber) the best for textual collaboration. XMPP has a "group chat" or "conference" facility (often known under the TLA of "MUC" - multi-user chat). This can work across Jabber federations. For example, you can join a group chat with me on our institutional Jabber server with your Google Talk account - no need to have an institutional account (assuming I authorise you as a contact).
On a Mac, iChat comes with buillt-in Jabber support - or you can use the multiprotocol messaging client Adium. Adium built on the free software "libpurple" library that is the core of Pidgin IM (formerly Gaim). There's a version of Pidgin for Linux and Windows. Pidgin and Adium have straightforward support for Jabber group chat.
For a bit more than just chatting, try the Coccinella - a Jabber client with a shared whiteboard capability, and first class conference room management tools. (The Coccinella has Jingle support so, under the right circumstances, it's capable of voice chat, too).
It's interesting how instant messaging is becoming almost a command-line for the 21st century. I keep Adium running all the time, so I'm generally reachable for a chat. Clever developers have leveraged this by providing chat interfaces to other services. Twitterers know they can send their tweets via their IM client. There's also a service called IMified, which has a range of widgets for interacting with other services like blogs, calendars, and online todo-lists. I could access an awful lot of services armed with an IM-enabled mobile phone and an IMified account. IMified has an open API, so developers can create their own widgets.
Anyway - I wonder are edu-chat clients like Elluminate the way to go, or do clients like the Coccinella and Adium (free software, both), and chat-based service providers like IMified offer more interesting possibilities?
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Comments
hhmmmmm interesting.
I was part of an online conference last week, which was only text chat (and also discussion boards), and i found it quite hard. While i love text chat myself, and much prefer to type than to talk in the conference environment, at the same time, i like the voice element, its often much easier to keep up with, and you can continue to listen if you "have" to do something else for a moment while you are part of the conference/event.
I like how in elluminate you can request the microphone to talk, so you can have a structured conversation without everyone jumping in on top of eachother all the time.
I think there are merits to using just text software, and merits to using voice or voice and text, depending on the type of event/conversation that is to take place.
Some things can be covered well in just text, but others, can be much harder.
For example at the conference i was at last week, lots of different things were being said, and they weren't always the same thing, so it was hard to keep up with what was happening. I know that some of the questions and things got missed, because there was so much going on in the discussion.
Perhaps if it was more of a structured text area that would work well, where you request to speak. Again, that would depend on the type of interaction you were involved in.
So basically i say theres room for both, depending on the context.
Some very good points, Nicola. I think I agree there's room for both (though the room I work in here at Rave isn't the place for voice). Conch-passing in voice chats is a good way to stop a cacophony developing. It's harder to do this is MUC text chat - it takes a while to get into the flow of things, and not be answering something half a page in the past. Instant messaging slang and jargon helps give a verbal feel, and is more concise - but can be inscrutable and intimidating for "noobs".
I've been generally impressed with the text to speech on Mac OS X: it's possible to get a quasi-auditory feel assuming people don't use too much IM jargon.
What I really like about text chat, though, is transcripts - so much easier than getting sense out of an audio blob. Some sort of infallible speech-to-text transcription gizmo would be really handy. But until then, text is good.