Technology and APPS: Web-based and Mobile

links to all the different platforms and
apps that we're going to be talking
about today that will be available on
our web page under our workshops and
classes link probably later today or
tomorrow so as I mentioned the platforms
that we're going to be talking about
today are ones that we've heard from the
community about though they're using
with their office or at work with
organizations that they're working with
so we're going to talk about zoom google
meet which on gmail would be Google
Hangouts Microsoft teams Skype and then
for those smaller interactions or
one-on-one interactions up FaceTime and
duo zoom seems to be one of the most
popular that folks are using for online
meetings there is a basic free plan for
zoom obviously it is a video
conferencing platform that allows for
real-time messaging you can chat back
and forth and of course we can share our
screens and share content as well the
basic free plan includes up to a hundred
people in a meeting which is huge that's
awesome but it limits you to 40 minutes
for a meeting for those group meetings
now one on one zoom meetings is an
unlimited number it also does not matter
how many meetings that you have a month
zooom does have a closed caption option
in its settings so the host can turn on
the closed captions for a particular
meeting and you all if you have a
personal zoom account can go into your
settings and make sure that closed
caption is activated for any meeting
where it's available the host has to
either assign a participant to type
everything or bring in a third party
captioner like the Park Service there
are ways if no one's available to
caption there are ways to use AI
captions and have that speech-to-text
option by sharing your screen and we'll
talk a little bit more about that and of
course really important practice using
these before you actually need to use
them during a meeting google meet has
been really interesting as well this is
part of the G suite plan that is
available to businesses and
organizations if you have gmail for your
personal email this would be the
equivalent to hangouts it's just that
some more features again you've got the
video conferencing and chat you can
share screens and it has a built-in
automatic captions so that voice
recognition captions can be used for
your meetings this is part of the Google
cloud that is available for businesses
so it's got Gmail and a bunch of other
Google Apps it's six dollars a month per
user per month but also has a 14 14-day
trial so that you can try it out and see
if it's actually going to eat to work
for your particular situation a lot of
groups are using Microsoft teams
particularly government offices you've
got that sharing a video sharing of
content and then your real-time
messaging it does not currently have a
AI captions built in it is a preview
feature currently however I mean let me
back up it has a preview feature that
uses AI captions but that is not
available for the government level
clouds it is currently available for
businesses not government so hopefully
we will see that roll out to the broader
Microsoft teams in the future another
thing that is helpful with Microsoft
teams is that you can blur your
background so if you are at home and you
know the only place you have to set up
your computer has all kinds of stuff
behind you you can blur the background
so that it focuses just on you
couple of other programs like zoom you
can choose an artificial background but
that doesn't always work well if you
yourself is a Sun or a signer because it
can get a little your hands can
disappear and odd things can happen so
be familiar with what the options are
before you decide to choose that for
your for your online meetings Microsoft
teams is $5 per user per month and that
is an annual fee that you pay however if
you're being invited to a meeting say
you need to join a meeting at a
government office online they can send
you an invitation and you
can join that Microsoft teams meeting at
no charge to you as the user Skype is
another one that we've seen for years
it's a video conferencing content
sharing real-time messaging it does have
a captioning feature built in and
provides again those AI captions and
actually can even do some translation
from one language to another which is
interesting for those Skype calls on a
rather Skype online meetings you can
have up to 49 participants
you can also blur that background again
and Skype to Skype calls are free now
for some of those smaller calls where
there might just be a couple of you
google duo and FaceTime can be really
helpful it gives you that video call so
you're able to see each other google duo
is also available both for Android
phones and iPhones which is nice because
you can go across platforms so let's
talk a little bit about captioning cart
which is the communication access
real-time translation is always going to
give you the best captions they're going
to be the more accurate captions and of
course they require a skilled captioner
so you would be hiring a caption service
like today we have Beverly but there are
many different captioners out there and
we can include resources on where to
find them you want to talk with your
captioner about which platforms they're
experienced with and they can help you
work out how to get those captions
included in your online meetings of
course the other option is they can send
you a link like our stream text link and
you can open up the captions on a
separate device whether that's your
tablet or a second computer screen or
your smartphone so that you can have
your meeting and then your captions
the other option is to use the automatic
captions those artificial intelligence
or machine voice recognition captions
obviously they're not going to be as
accurate different people have different
ways of speaking have different accents
their microphone might not be very good
there's all these aspects that can
impact that machine translation it is
slowly getting better so that's that it
is an option that you should consider
and generally is going to cost less it
can be a quick substitute for those
short meetings where you may not be able
to get live captions you can get those
captions on a mobile device through an
app like on your smartphone or tablet
and of course there are desktop options
as well if you've ever seen the automat
Auto captions on YouTube that is a form
of those machine recognition machine
voice recognition captions so let's talk
about some of those apps that you can
use when you just can't get live
captions we've got Google live
transcribe Ava otter transcribed live
and then a browser-based one called web
caption or comm and you have choices on
how to use these you can use it on your
phone your tablet your computer you
obviously do need to have an internet
connection of some sort so Wi-Fi
Ethernet cellular connections and then
these can be used almost anywhere as
long as you've got that online
connection you can use it at home use it
at work when you're
at the store for those brief
interactions at a doctor's office and
again practice before you need to use it
so here's an example we've got someone
using their cell phone to caption the
video call that they're on so after
they've connected the video call they
set their phone right next to the
computer where they can see it and they
turn up the volume on the computer so
that the phone will pick it up every now
and then we find those programs that
just don't have captions on TV or on
your streaming service try out some of
these captioning apps and see what you
think you'll need to put your phone
closer to the TV so it can pick up the
sound turn up the volume on the TV and
let the app pick up the captions for you
and today of course the really important
thing is social distancing people are
staying six feet apart they're wearing
masks when they have to go out and there
are not many masks available that have
the little window for lip-reading
this is where another situation where
those apps can come in handy so you can
hold your phone out activate the app and
ask the person that you're that is
talking to you to speak at a good slow
pace and speak clearly Google live
transcribed is one of the apps that
folks are using it is powered by
Google's speech recognition technology
so it's got a nice flow if the words pop
up as you are speaking if you've got a
Wi-Fi connection or a cellular
connection you're good to go this app
was actually developed in partnership
with Gallaudet University to make sure
that it was something that would be
useful for folks the downside of this
app is that it's only available for
Android devices but it is one of the
free apps that are out there
ava is another app that's really helpful
for folks
it actually was made for kind of group
situations with the AVA app you can
invite people to join your conversation
and their cell phones pick up their
voice which will then identify them so
you can see who is speaking this is
helpful again in these social distancing
situations we actually found in testing
this app you don't even have to be in
the same room you can chat from other
rooms with each other
Ava offers up to five hours free per
month and then if you want you can go
ahead and subscribe to Eva either at
$14.99 per month per host or you can pay
it up front we have one hundred and
eighty dollars a year otter is another
app that folks are finding very helpful
particularly with meetings it is free up
to 600 minutes per month and then you
can also get paid subscriptions Ava and
otter
both work on Android and Apple devices
otter can also be used on a desktop
computer but it is one of the
subscription ones as well either at 8.30
three cents a month or $100 a year one
of the Apple only or iOS only device
apps rather is transcribed live the
first 15 minutes are free and after that
you can either pay per hour or you can
do a yearly subscription
web captioner is a browser-based
automatic captioning it does require
that you use the Chrome browser but it's
nice because you can open that up on
your tablet on your smart phone on a
separate screen if you're one of those
folks that works with two computer
screens and have your captions with your
online meeting there's no charge for web
captioner com but you can donate to help
keep it free for everybody another one
that I realized this morning that we
forgot is a service provided by the
Virginia relay it's called remote
conference captioning and will include
this in our resource list when we post
it to our website
remote conference captioning was
developed for conference calls not
necessarily the video conference calls
but was developed for traditional
conference calls so that you and the
captioner can both call into the meeting
and then you can log on to a website to
see the captions and that's provided at
no cost through Virginia relay and we
understand that some folks are using
that with the online video meeting
platform what you'll need to do is
provide the RCC remote conference
captioning service the phone number for
the zoom meeting that you or whichever
meeting you want to go into but we'll
include that information on our
conference on our resource list since it
totally blanked my mind to include it
here
for those short very brief interactions
you can use a voice recognition app to
the ones that we found our card Zilla
and pages both are free apps what they
let you do is when you're you've
encountered someone and you're having
trouble understanding them you activate
the app and hit the microphone button so
that they speak into your microphone and
it will print it out for you and a
couple of other useful apps that we
wanted to include our buzz cards this is
provided by Sorenson video relay these
are pre typed cards so you can if you
know those interactions that you have
everyday like going to the coffee shop
grabbing the taxi every day you can type
that information into these buzz cards
and save them on your phone that way
when you go up to the counter at the
coffee shop you just show them hey large
coffee cream sugar please and the other
one that we found was Jeannie
this is a live interpreting app that you
pay a dollar a minute but it includes
ASL interpreting so for those brief
conversations where you're struggling to
understand and you need a sign language
interpreter you can use this app on your
smartphone to connect with a live
interpreter to get that information
across
okay Wow we kind of went through things
that's it probably took us about the
same amount of time as our practice so
now we wanted to open up for questions
from you all and so we do ask that you
type your questions into the chat and we
will address those as we can if we're
not able to cover them if we need to do
some more research or if you prefer not
to ask them live you can send us an
email to info at mvrc org and we can
answer them later on for you or research
them and get back to you okay let's take
a look over at the chat window here
great hey we do have some folks that use
the remote conference captioning with
zoom meetings and they love it yay
that's awesome
I see one about the hosts captions
option the ones that we have now are
open caption they're not adjustable by
the participants but that's why we also
supply the stream text link so that you
could see the full text on another
device and adjust the size of the text
but you are correct that the host must
make the captioning available for that
particular meeting before folks can make
those adjustments correct is live
transcribed by Google to be available on
iPhone users not really Google does this
for their identity and they've developed
it but the transcribed live uses the
same technology but it's a pay you pay
as you go
type captioning and remember we are
recording this webinar so it will be
posted on our website later and you'll
be able to find it under the workshops
and classes link along with the resource
page that we're going to be posting
there we will have almost all the links
that we refer to in the apps or
applications and some of the information
pages about each application
we will have it recorded and you'll be
able to review the session again I guess
okay the Sorenson buzz cards that we put
up that actually is separate from the
video phone app that Sorenson provides
so it is a separate app that you can
download to your cell phone we will post
the PowerPoint to the website as a
separate document there was another
question look I saw where now I just got
to find it again
okay so Lena asked about an hour-long
video that they would love to have
captions for so what would be the best
way to get the captions this is we're
trying one of those voice-to-text apps
that we talked about so Google live
transcribe Ava otter on try using one of
those apps or the webcam or the web
captioner on a browser a computer
browser because then you can make the
text real large
obviously this is just a small sampling
of the kinds of technologies that are
out there if you all have heard about
something that you really like please
send us an email and let us know so that
we can improve our resource lists to
share with others yes
today's captioning was provided by our
cart captioner Beverly so we have a live
captioner listening in who is typing
word-for-word what we are saying and and
the product that we're using to overlay
the captions is what is it street scene
asked
yeah stream cast we're actually
providing open captions right oh sorry
yes and of course the other option to
this Beverly gave us a stream text link
that you can put in a web browser and
open up the full page of the captions
there's one asking about why teams's and
used allowed by the government clouds I
think a lot of that is one it's new to
security for government agencies is
requirement and that there might be an
issue
technically of why the captions or would
not be because it has to go out to a
computer and then come back to be
captioned and they might not like the
idea of an outside organizations
computer listening in to a conversation
there's one there about web caps
intercom on our iPhone I'm not sure why
it won't work on an iPhone I would hope
is I would hope that it might be because
it's a phone by itself I think it mostly
works only in web browsers on Mac or
Windows so yes you're correct it didn't
work for me either someone asked about
how Ava compares to an app like in Oh
caption so in Oh caption is an app you
can put on your phone to have captioned
telephone calls that's actually separate
from what we're talking about today
ava is a is a chat app and so it is for
those voice to text communications where
you've got one on one person in front of
you or some distance from you or a group
of people say around a table so the
purposes of Ava and a no caption are
actually separate you want to take the
one on open versus closed to explain the
difference sure thing
so when you set up these meetings open
captioned means everybody sees the same
thing on the screen so today we have a
box open on our presentation screen so
everybody can see the captions as they
are being tight say you had a zoom
meeting where you decided to use closed
caption once the host gets everything
set up and linked the user who is
watching the the zoom meeting can decide
to see those captions or not
and there would actually be a little box
that me as a viewer of the meeting can
click on and activate the captions so
I'm the only one seeing them on my
screen and the rest of the people in the
zoom meeting cannot see it so Ava would
not be used for phone calls it would be
used in group conversations but they can
be a pretty large distances correct
Ava uses your phone to interpret what
people are saying around you as opposed
to you know caption or one of the other
caption phone apps which is physically
for phone calls a regular zoom user
actually is giving us some information
about zoom they say that zoom is doing a
beta testing of AI captioning now that's
good to hear they hear it's better than
Google meets automatic captioning of
course automatic captioning is awesome
it's a great option when you can't get
the live captioning but if you need
really accurate captions you're going to
need a live captioner thank you for that
at the present time the webinar which is
what we're doing this is a zoom webinar
we we control who's visible on screen
and that's to have it so we present more
in a normal zoom meeting you would have
the ability to see other participants
and have conversation as a group so
that's a big difference between zoom
webinars and zoom meetings so I think
our questions are slowing down we'll
give it a few more minutes here the host
can pin the interpreter but the
individual viewers can also decide to
pin the interpreter but in the webinar
we are the interpreter has come in as a
panelist and in that situation we do
have control over the visibility of that
of the interpreters window so you're not
going to be able to pin or unten the
interpreter so in a normal meeting
though where you do have many
participants you want to pin the
interpreter so they always are visible
on screen and that control for pinning
the interpreter if you hover over their
little video you'll see three dots and
if you click on those three dots it'll
give you options and one of those is pin
that video
we're going back to a question about the
webinar yes the interpreter is a
panelist and not a co-host nancy was
asking if we were if we will be able to
find this session later yes we are going
to be posting the webinar itself the
PowerPoint and a resource page on our
website and you'll be able to find it
under the workshops and classes link on
our website later on
YouTube is a streaming platform and
depending on how people present on it
it's a delivery provider it's an open
type link that allows you to watch a
webinar usually it's one direction it's
from the presentation out so YouTube is
a great service usually as an
organization you can get it free and it
has live streaming it is a great service
for churches organizations like mvrc and
many others all right any more questions
well thank you I think this has gone
pretty smoothly for our first webinar we
hope to do and others soon and maybe
we'll pick some new topics if you have
any ideas please send it to info at NVR
c.org
this has been awesome
thank you all for learning with us and
as Bruce said you know there's a lot of
technology out there so we've got more
topics that'll be coming up if there's
something you specifically want to know
about send us an email and we'll
research it and get back to you and
maybe even make a new webinar out of it
thank you all so much for coming today
thank you to our wonderful captioner and
interpreter you all give us access and
we love you for that so thank you all
and you all have a great week
oops