[AG-TECH] Echo canceller

[Markus Buchhorn]

At 10:30 22/07/2003 -0500, Robert Olson wrote:
>And if you're clever, you can make the button cause the gentner to mute the mic, and make the gentner drive the LED based on mute status. This way, the gentner is always listening on the mic and doing it's EC/ambient noise level adaptation measurements.

Very cute indeed - I'll have a look at that also. The Polycom has logic in/out ports that can be used for the same purposes (and drive that "On Air" LED discussed earlier :-) ).

But from my experience it gets in the way of natural interaction. People forget to mute, or they don't feel the need to mute. They think they're being very quiet and don't realise the pick-up region of the mike. In some meetings I've seen (heard!) people working through their paperwork right next to the mike, and completely overwhelming the other inputs :-(

It is much nicer to just walk into a room and talk, with no buttons to push, no need to educate users than the bare minimum, no whispered 'mute your mike' comments, no SMS messages from remote sites asking you to mute ;-) etc.

Doesn't suit every room though.

Cheers,
        Markus


Markus Buchhorn, ANU Internet Futures Project,      | Ph: +61 2 61258810
Markus.Buchhorn at anu.edu.au, mail: Bldg #108 - CS&IT |Fax: +61 2 61259805
Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Aust.|Mob: 0417 281429