Hello Local Guides! There’s a lot of curiosity here in the Local Guides Dominicana community and I have been asked so many questions about Connect Live that I think I should organise a virtual meet-up to be able to answer them all before the application period begins. So, I have the idea, now I need to know “how” to make it…
How can one host a virtual meet-up? Any expert who can guide me in that??
I bet that @ErmesT @FaridTDF @KarenVChin or @Jesi are able to share some light on the topic.
A few days ago I planned a virtual meet-up through hangout @Marichams As we could not fix the theme of the meet-up so it is yet to come. I think you will get some nice ideas from moderators you have tagged here. Thanks.
Looking forward to get some ideas over here! How were you planing to do it in hangout @MukulR ? I must confess I have a thousand years without using it!
Imho, @Marichams , to make an online Meet Up, you need to use video live streaming service that can be use by multiple users. Google Hangout is an option.
Instagram live streaming or Youtube live streaming are more like monologue.
You cannot use text-based chat to make a conference. That just won’t do. Imho
Hola @Marichams
Sorry for reaching you so late.
The Local Guides Meet-up site don’t have a structure for supporting a “virtual meet-up”. I know this very well because in the past I asked about the same subject too 
But I was virtually in a @SoniaK 's meet-up, for responding to the questions about the Local Guide Program (do you remember, Sonia?) and I had several guests from America (last one was @KarenVChin ) who attended virtually our “wine meet-ups”
My opinion is that you should organize a Meet-up, with a real physical Location, and provide to the ones that cannot join physically a link for joining on video.
We normally use Google Hangout, as you can add people to the conversation on an easy way, but there are a lot of tools available for a video chat.
Just be careful about the way you manage the contact information of the ones who attend virtually, respecting the privacy and avoiding to collect personal data.
On my personal experience related to the hangout I hosted with Karen before Connect Live 2018 and 2019, you need to pay also attention to the maximum number of people who attend virtually: it is really hard to give space to more than 10 people, if you want to give to everyone the same space for introduce themselves and for talking, while in a Q&A session you can easily manage up to 20 persons.
Hope this can help you. I am curious to see how this evolves, so please keep me tagged.
A big hug
@Marichams — you always have interesting ideas and interesting questions.
Yes, I have been asked to join meetups “virtually.” Lately, one for @ErmesT ‘s annual Italian Wine Weekend meetup and @RobAo ’s meetup with the Lagos Local Guides using Facebook Messenger’s video chat. Both times I was in my pjs because of the 9+ hours time difference.
As Ermes stated, the dynamics of hosting and being on a virtual meetup is much different than being in a physical one.I have hosted during pre Connect Live 2018 & 2019 four Information Meetups using Hangouts to get attendees who have questions about traveling to San Francisco/America and what to expect at Connect Live together.
I have only used Hangouts vs the other video conferencing apps, such as Zoom, because it is free, it’s a Google product, and I can only have 10 people join including me.
As Ermes mentioned, it is hard to have more than 10 people on a video conference call because if is more than that not everyone get to speak and it becomes more of a lecture than an interactive event where each attendee can fully participate, get to know one another equally.
Also, I use fun icebreaker questions to get attendees talking. People in general are shy if they are new to a group. It is even more challenging if you are on a video call because you are talking to the your camera, not everyone is fluent in one language, everyone is meeting for the first time, and also you have to be clear up front on having everyone be in a quiet room while on the virtual meetup. Street noise can really be annoying and will disrupt your virtual meetup because it is loud on your ears and eats into your meetup because it will stop the momentum and dynamics of your virtual meetup in a second.
If you are all in the same time zone it’s easier to schedule and get participation.
For me, mine have been global Virtual meetups because I schedule them to be either 6 am SF Time or at 11 pm
SF Time to get participation from around the globe.
Hope this give you more food for thoughts here.
Cheers,
Karen
Hi @ErmesT , yes, I do remember the meetup. How can I forget it? That was my first ever meetup in Dallas.
Hi @Marichams , I hosted that meetup at a real location, where some local local guides joined me for the meetup. We also had a virtual session (I created an event in G+ using the same time) where we had Ermes, @OSAMA and @HelloSamsonR with us. It was a wonderful session indeed. But now, as G+ is shut down, you can use hangout for hosting such meetup. We have a master in hosting such events virtually and he does that every year before Connect Live, to get introduced to the other CL joining Local Guides and also to discuss if anyone has any questions or queries. @AdrianLunsong taught me how to host such event. All you have to do it go to hangout, click on the video call button, you will prompt to invite people. Copy the link and share it with the people you want to do the meetup with. I would suggest to create a post here using the link and date and time. So the scheduled time interested people can join you by clicking on that link. You also have to click on the same link to join the call. If you open a new conversation window, the link might get changed. Please remember, maximum 15 people can join in a hangout session. SO it has to be first come first serve basis. While you continue the session, you can request the first comers to leave the session once they get their answers so that other people can join the session as well. (Adrian, guru, did I explain this clearly?)
I hope you find it easy to host a virtual meetup using the above option or any other options that the others suggested. Don’t forget to share a recap once you host such meetup. You can also host a real meetup, at a physical location, as Ermes suggested, and invite other people virtually using that link. That’s what I did on my meetup 3 years ago. It was quite a hit.
Thanks for tagging me on this @KarenVChin .
@Marichams I submitted a request for a distributed meet-up to test it out, however the first submission was rejected and I updated it to try and correct any errors. If it gets approved, I’ll let you know how it goes. Main point of note is privacy and data collection is something that the Local Guides program is sensitive about and what I’m trying to ensure the meet-up won’t misuse it. Ideally Zoom is the best way to go since you have a video link that people can join by link and be closed down afterwards. If you plan on having a screenshare, it also works.
Hola @Marichams , recién veo el post, lo siento 
, pero como indica @ErmesT o @KarenVChin , es la mejor manera.
Mi sugerencia es que realices varias Hangouts, ya que en caso de que no cuentes con Google Suite, no podrás tener mas de 10 invitados a una video charla, de todas maneras mas de esa cantidad en general son inmanejables por la cantidad de personas que deseen hablar a la vez.
La otra manera es que directamente tenga un vivo de YouTube, pero seria en una solo sentido, creo que lo mejor es que comiences con un Hangouts.
Mucha suerte.
Saludos Farid.
Hi @Marichams ! There are good answers, tips and suggestions already in this conversation so I will try to not repeat what’s already been said. I think before you start with the ‘how’, you should think about the structure of your virtual meet-up because this will help you decide which online tool is best.
Here are some of my own tips:
Anyway, I hope that helps to make it easy to do the virtual meetup. As always, do encourage folks to apply, do give them the confidence to do so, be very clear that your answers are your opinions and may not reflect what the official Local Guides team thinks (unless it’s something that you can quote directly from their official post), You could advice folks to think ahead and use 2020 to strengthen themselves and their experiences as a Local Guide to apply for 2021. Also, do stress as well the importance of quality vs quantity! It’s not about the points or the levels (although that shows a certain level of maturity but can easily be gamed as well).
I wish you all the best in setting this up! And hopefully it will be very successful!
