Terence Kent
My feedback
9 results found
-
2 votes
-
94 votes
-
17 votes
-
12 votes
-
4 votes
An error occurred while saving the comment -
326 votes
An error occurred while saving the comment The self-view window ruins this tool for children <12. You know, the crowd who is exceptionally isolated right now. For them, it changes the Portal from a way to connect with family and friends into an anxiety-inducing game.
Try having a conversation in-person while staring in the mirror, then try to do it while watching yourself on a TV, then try to do it while watching yourself on a TV with random effects overlaid on you. Now, imagine you're under 12. Are you paying any attention to the other people on the screen?
-
39 votes
An error occurred while saving the comment Just to add to this - GTM and Google Meet all have wonderful solutions for this situation that completely solve the "sync/coordination" problem you described.
(1) For casual and unscheduled interaction, there is a virtual "open space". It's named, linkable, and has pre-authorized users who can join at any time. There may nobody in there when you join - but you can just pop in. This works like a front yard or open conference room. It's incredibly useful and removes the need to coordinate small interactions through email or IM.
(2) For scheduled calls, a link-based tool works just like you described. However, with the important addition that the invited user accounts are pre-authorized, so they can just join the call as long as it is active. This makes the process of setting up the meeting pain-free.
We could really use this feature since we're all connecting to each other from home these days.
-
7 votes
-
111 votes
Unfortunately, I've had similar results and I distributed about 10 of these to family members.
For us, the video is acceptable, but the audio cut outs are terrible. Makes it impossible when connecting kids to each other.
It appears to be a problem with the noise cancelling/auto-mute features. If you pair a bluetooth headset to the portal and have the sound output go through there (so it doesn't get picked up by the portal mic), it's better.
Honestly, I regret the purchases. I should have spent more on iPads or something else. I dumped a few thousand into these and a bunch of hours to make them work. Didn't expect this.