Automatic conference call for members with no internet

[garnsb]

We're webcasting from our buildings with a sweet one-button solution...which is so easy ward leadership can do it, but we have an additional challenge. We have several people in the stake that do not have an internet connection in their home...but they do have a phone. Has anyone found a good solution that requires no technical involvement each week, and doesn't use minutes in people's cell phone plans, that could share the audio going into the webcast with an audio conference? As a side note, there is no hardline telephone service in our buildings anymore.

Tools like "freeconferencecall.com" could work really well, but I have to get the audio into it and somehow make a call each week. I'd love to do this without relying on anyone's cell phone and make it "automatic" like we've been able to do with the webcasting solution...so I thought I'd throw it out there and see if anyone else has experience with something I should look at in this area....

[garnsb]

If the church has SIP enabled on the Zoom accounts...it would work perfectly, but alas, such is not the case. Anyone know if that is something the church would be willing to look into? Not really sure who to ask.

[brad_p]

We use freeconferencecall.com. It's not straightforward, at all. This post isn't to persuade you to do it our way, just to show you that getting it to work right for sacrament meeting is tricky. But the end result is great, a single 10 digit phone number that goes straight to meeting audio. Here is how we do it:

* First, we spend $4 a month per building to have a phone number without a meeting code.
* I then paid for and installed Virtual Audio Cable so that I can make sound output be sound input. I installs a "Virtual Cable Line 1". (You could probably get the same effect if your laptop had an audio out and an audio in, and you bought a simple 2 male end 3.5mm cable that looped the output back into input.)
* Then, we use OBS to broadcast.
* We use the free tool MonaServer to create a local RTMP server. (We use this to also "tap" into the RTMP stream and copy it to our video broadcasting sites.)
* We use OBS and stream to the local MonaServer.
* Then the free media player software VLC is used. I have it play a network stream, listening in on the MonaServer local address. I then disable video. I have the audio play on that Virtual Cable Line 1.
* Then we launch FreeConferenceCall's app. I host a meeting. I set the audio to listen in on Virtual Cable Line 1. I go to Attendees and click "Lecture Mode".

That's it. Easy Right?

The good news. 1) Any normal broadcast audio is also fed straight into the phone. 2) It's also lightweight, using only uses a few % of CPU usage. 3) FreeConferenceCall emails you a full list of call ins, times, names, and numbers.

The bad news. 1) Even with all this I've found that one laptop often "loses" the Virtual Cable Line 1 when the laptop goes into sleep mode, so I have to reboot to get it to all work. 2) Despite rolling this out to every ward and advertising it to two of our care center branches, we're finding only 3-4 people use the service each week. It seems when people hit the age that they can't use technology, they also don't want to dial a phone number either. 3) Every now and then freeconferencecall.com gives a busy signal when you call in.

Before we did freeconferencecall.com, we tried using Zoom and listening to a single mic. But then we had to constantly watch as people came in to make sure they were admitted and had their phone muted. It was a real chore. We like freeconferencecall.com better.

[brad_p]

The easiest way I think to make FreeConferenceCall.com work would be like so:

At home, have a PC that has male-to-male 3.5mm cable sending the audio out back into a line in (may need TRS-to-TRRS adapter). Then listen to the sacrament meeting. Then start up freeconferencecall's app. Have it listen on the line in. Set it to lecture mode. That's it.