So...video conferencing, home working, your house and your colleague's houses

[chomalungma]

Interesting seeing colleagues' houses at the moment - you hear about them but interesting to see them properly.

Plus all the background chat, occasional family interruptions etc

I have tidied up a bit more!

How have people found video conferencing with colleagues?

Things to hide”. No just avoid judgy fuckers

I will admit to trying to see what books someone had

My house looks seriously stunning due to a beautiful bay window looking onto lush trees and a magnificent fireplace in the background. In reality the fireplace is way too big for the living room and the luxurious garden is overgrown tree. I rather like how my house looks on videoconferencing

Two of my cats have gate crashed meetings so far, as have the various children, cats etc of my colleagues. Makes people more human - we all have a life outside work

Mine's a blank wall. No one should have to feel inferior to my groaning bookshelf

No, really I'm videocalling teens, and they don't need to see my flat. I'm tempted to change my backdrop, but I don't know yo what. Plus I'm on hangouts, so I don't think you can do anything technologically fancy.

Perhaps I'll just get ds to make me a different hat every day.

DH tried out a virtual background, this morning, then Ds2 loomed into the room (lanky autistic teen so looms a lot) and appeared as a disembodied head :o

I don't turn my camera on. I'm on a daily call and only one or two people turn their cameras on.

Someone from another org called me today and asked me to put my camera in and I refused.

I saw this on LinkedIn today. Seems about right.

I love it, you get to see other people's houses but I'm nosey like that

I always make sure I sit with a blank wall behind me!

We all turn ours on! Most people have bland white walls but I'm working in the living room and since my desk is in the corner you can see the whole room... I couldn't be arsed to tidy the other day and got shamed during our virtual lunch hour! Needless to say I tidied before today's meeting!

I seem to be on video 7 hours a day right now. With a blank wall behind me

I tried the virtual background but looked like a disembodied head with weird eyes

We're audio only thank goodness!

DH has worked at home for years - computer industry.

His "video calls" show his photo ID only - 10 years ago with more hair & less grey than now!
Nothing else is considered necessary.

I e had kids on every conference call I've had so far. Mine and/or others depending whose shift it is! I love it!

I also change rooms every time because I've recently moved and love my house and wanna show it off. Haha yes hit me with your shit for that, I don't care

At the moment quite a few appear to be having 'camera problems.' But still on audio which is disconcerting.

I'm shocked that the angle I'm at makes me look like I have five chins. Not really noticed backgrounds really at the moment.

I love all the pets, decor and interruptions. Everyone in our organisation has their video on, or if they don't they usually mention why e.g. bandwidth, crap lighting. I find it much easier to connect when I can see people's faces.

What's interesting though is the amazing HD camera setups and very staged-looking rooms of our execs. One exec has a full piano behind him in videos, another a wood cathedral-style ceiling.

My cat love the laptop. I guess it's warm. He jumped on it yesterday mid call and am fairly sure gave everyone a close up of his arse.

I’m loving having a nosey at everyone’s rooms. Sadly someone discovered the ‘blur background’ feature on Teams (on the more options pop-up menu during a call) so my spying opportunities have been curtailed.

We have videos on here, now in week 3 ( we were early adopters of wfh). People have started caring less. Week 1 lots of voice only, week 2 blurred backgrounds, week 3 we are taking people on tours or comparing washing piles, weed infested gardens, damp patches, and on Mondays we have Baking Bad - evidence that we really shouldn't have bought flour.

Extra points are awarded for random hair sticking up, children & pets photo bombing, family arguments and partners walking through in non work friendly attire.

We’re having a team meeting with pets on Monday. DD already called one of my team to demand to see his rabbit He’s a nice chap and had his girlfriend fetch it for him.

To be honest part of our job has always been using zoom so we are so used to it we are so far past the worrying about having a video camera on. We were actually laughing about this today that everyone is going through all the " not giving anything away" stage as they are getting used to it, we all make sure the background is appropriate for Learners but because we have been so used to it we all have areas set up in our homes that we can zoom from.

Most of us have subtle backgrounds that dont have family photos etc but you learn that when you are doing it all day every day a white background makes it really intense for the people on the other end.

We just dont really stress anymore , everyone has a jacket ready to look professional on the top half.

However during team only sessions we regularly get interrupted by a child, dog , parrot etc and if we are talking about something important we all ignore it, or if we are on a lighter note we say hello to the child , dog , manatee.

Earlier one colleagues teenage son was making faces behind her and we all sold him out instantly , he got a telling off from ten grumpy assessors

She was killing herself laughing.

I interviewed someone for a role the other day and want to move into her house. It was obviously a study that had wall to wall, packed, jumbly bookshelves and, judging by the lighting, huge windows just out of shot. I also saw her beautiful black cat. She was perfect for the role, but frankly I’d vote to hire her for her home styling!

I’m working from the kitchen table, and the “background” is the sink and fridge. I’ve been doing video calls with students who are mainly in their beds, but one girl has a toddler so I brought her through to the bedroom so the wee one could see our cat - she was ever so cute, trying to stroke her through the screen!

DP actually showed me how to blur the backdrop yesterday so I might do that from now on.

To avoid the double-chin look, I raise the laptop with a couple of books underneath!