I recently helped put together a conference session about the law and filtering that involved a G+ hangout with a panel of remote guests. It took us a while to find the combination of things that worked the best with the room audio so I thought I’d jot some notes down on what worked while it’s still fresh in my mind.
First, we had two computers running, one that “owned” the G+ hangout and was projected for the group (computer A) and one that was for a panel participant/moderator (computer B).
The hangout was started on G+ on computer A. Everyone who was on the panel (including one person who was actually in the room) was invited to hangout.
Computer A was connected to large room speakers. The mic was kept muted.
The person on Computer B used headphones and a mic. When she wasn’t talking, she muted her mic. When she was talking, we muted the big room speakers connected to computer A. (This mostly eliminated the annoyance of her hearing herself echo back through the big speakers a second or so after she spoke.)
We initially had some feedback issues, but doing the above and turning down the speaker volume seemed to resolve it.
We also had another session in a different room watching the hangout and that worked fine as well. (In fact, when we got knocked off the wireless and couldn’t get back on, they were able to continue on without us.)
Below is the end result. (One thing I learned was that when a hangout ends on the initiator’s computer, it will go on with others, but the broadcast cuts off.) Thanks to everyone on our panel and in the audience that made this possible.