Better Videoconferencing: Mute Your Microphone Like a Pro

What makes videoconferencing sessions better? Better audio. What makes better audio? Judicious muting by all participants. Here are some tips to Mute Jockey like a pro: Keep your microphone muted whenever there are sounds around you that others need not hear or distract from the session. This includes typing, pets, family sounds, sirens, eating, coughing, sneezing and so on. UNMUTE your microphone to ask questions, make comments, laugh or provide spontaneous audible vocal responses. Hearing laughs is great, unmute for them! And then MUTE again. If you dial in to a videoconference on your phone, you need to manage muting on your phone. Since phones are the most problematic for audio quality and background noise, please keep them muted most of the time. Be aware of how to mute your microphone quickly and effectively in any videoconferencing application. In Webex the Microphone icon is in the lower left portion of your screen. The microphone is active (gray). If you click it, it will mute it and go inactive (red). In Collaborate, the microphone icon in is in the lower center of your screen. NOTE: by default, when you enter Collaborate your microphone and camera are DISABLED. You need to click the icons to enable them and test them. Finally, use the chat. We recommend you open the chat when you enter a videoconference, as this is a good way to communicate in case there are audio or other issues. Just note that not everyone may see your text chats, in which case you might also need to enable your microphone to speak up. See more info on Webex (https://sites.google.com/site/sswideateam/students/webex) and on Collaborate (https://sites.google.com/site/sswideateam/students/blackboard-collaborate)