Replacement for Zoom?
under review
Benjamin J
In a tutoring session I hosted today, my learners told me that Zoom is difficult for studies in their countries (I think they mentioned India and Iran) to use because it doesn't work well with their devices, so it would be better for them if schoolhouse.world gave us the option to use platforms other than Zoom for tutoring. I want to make my sessions accessible for everyone, so would it be possible for tutors to use apps besides Zoom?
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Tarun G
Hi Schoolhouse Team! Just Zooming in on this: I have no qualms with Zoom-based tutoring, and Zoom works in my region. But are we missing learners who need us most by not employing other video-conferencing platforms too? Google Meet is the obvious Zoom peer here, and in the future, what if we get a partnership with Meet too?
If Zoom is inacessible in places with students who'd benefit from SHW, and become amazing tutors themselves and avail all the perks of tutoring, is there something we could be doing? Clearly not in the near-term, but I'm just sharing this as an idea to bear in mind for the very long term.
Google may also want to partner with SHW someday, because Khan Academy's ex-COO is now Google for Education's VP and GM: https://twitter.com/ShantanuKSinha
Think how the Coda support came about. Something similar?
Drew Bent
under review
Thanks for this, Ben. This is a long-term question about how to make our video tech accessible to learners everywhere. If you or others have suggestions for alternatives to go alongside Zoom, let us know. Right now, Zoom supports most countries.
Suryaansh C
Drew Bent: Zoom is probably not be the best choice when it comes to accessibility, the main reason is computing power. Frankly speaking, I am not a fan of zoom, zoom is a bloat, besides it doesn't provide a privacy oriented self hosting solution. Privacytools.io which is a reputed site for internet privacy enthusiasts provide some easy alternatives to zoom https://www.privacytools.io/#voip
Suryaansh C
Drew Bent: I do agree this decision is hard, because many people will be used to using zoom since it is used in their class or their schools, and also we have dived into the programming with zoom. However, I would appreciate if you look into ways other than being non-for-profit and free to help learners. Usually, when something is free, it comes with a catch, and when that product is on the internet, data is that catch. We do collect a lot of unnecessary data already with Google analytics, and other similar tools. Maybe we can be the new non-for-profit that also values internet privacy?