Recording telephone calls

People that have been reading my Twitter feed will be aware that I have been writing Voluntary Arts England’s next publication on arts and wellbeing entitled Restoring the Balance: the effect of art participation on wellbeing and health.

The publication will be made up of interviews with people that have had their health and wellbeing transformed as a direct result of arts participation and will also feature expert analysis from leading voices in the field. Some of the interviews were conducted face to face.  For example I went to the Open Arts Studio in Darlington, danced with people with Parkinson’s Disease in Cumbria, and met up with former Voluntary Arts England staff member and long time panto star Brian Bell.

Most people though were interviewed over the telephone.  I don’t like to type while I am talking to people so I needed to find a way of recording call so that I could transcribe them at a later date.  I thought I would share how I did this for others that may find call recording useful,for any purpose, not just interviews.

Firstly I made all my calls using Skype which allow you to phone people using your computer and I downloaded the free piece of software MP3 Skype Recorder which is available from http://voipcallrecording.com

Problem solved.  Recording quality is great and both Skype and MP3 Skype Recorder are really easy to use.

If you like a lot of chocolate on your biscuit.

In 2007 Voluntary Arts England ran a national campaign in partnership with the Media Trust entitled Up for Arts which aimed to get more people participating in arts and crafts activities. One of the main events that took place during the campaign was a weeklong showcase of amateur art and craft groups in one of Europe’s largest shopping centres, the Metro Centre in Gateshead.

During the showcase I tried a variety of activities myself and one in particular stuck with me. I had never tried Tai Chi before but it was really enjoyable and when I found out that a weekly class took place at Newcastle’s Chinese Healthy Living Centre I didn’t hesitate to go along to learn (though having our England Coordinator agree to join me helped). The class was hugely enjoyable, most notably because I was the only male member which made me feel a little less self conscious (I now wholeheartedly recommend doing tai chi with a group of Chinese women to all male, 6’ 2”, 16 stone, working class Geordies).

Most of the women in the class spoke very little English (if any) so the learning process involved very little speech and I had to quickly adapt to other ways of learning (watching, gestures, nods, remembering recurring Chinese words and assuming their meaning through trial and error).

I enjoyed the class so much that I also signed up to a Chinese Mandarin night class (again with some England Coordinator support) so that I could do some basic conversing with my fellow classmates. After ten weeks of learning the basics of the language I strolled into the class all cocky and assured, streaming off Mandarin phrases like there was no tomorrow. Alas it was only then that I realised that the group spoke Cantonese and not Mandarin. Nevermind.

It was my very first experience of joining a group – everything that I have ever done in the past that could be classed as creative I have always done alone – piano, guitar etc. For one reason or the other I no longer go along to the classes any more but I thoroughly enjoyed them and I one day hope to take up Tai Chi again, and have also often looked enviously upon people that do Capoeira so who knows….

I tell you this entire story for no other reason than to mention the website www.clubbz.com which lets you search for local groups in your area. You can even add your own groups details if you wish. It’s really simple to use and I hope that as many people as possible use it as I think it would be great to have just one central location for people to find opportunities to participate. Take a look. It’s great.

www.clubbz.com

I just called to say…

When I moved home 18 months or so ago we changed telephone providers, going with one company for our phone, broadband and TV packages (So I could watch the wrestling of course, why else?)

I was shocked after the first few bills at how expensive the call charges were – 7p to connect a call and then just over 3p per minute after that. It may not sound like a huge amount but it quickly adds up if you are making lots of calls.

I found information about 18185.co.uk on a reputable money saving website and haven’t looked back since. In a nutshell (do read the full info on their website though) once you sign up to this service you just dial 18185 before the number you are calling and instead of paying your telephone providers call charges, whoever they may be, you pay a vastly reduced amount. There is no charge to sign up and it takes moments to register.

So for example at home a ten minute call to a landline during the day used to cost me around 37p. Using 18185 it now costs me 5p. My phone bills since have been about two thirds cheaper. I still pay line rental to my phone provider but now pay 18185 for my calls. It’s significantly cheaper for mobiles and international calls too!

You may be thinking that it’s a scam or just a ‘little bit dodgy’. Its not. I have been using it for over 12 months now and I know of other staff members who use similar ‘call override services’ – I mention this one as I personally use it.

You may be on an unlimited call package or special business tariff but if not try this at home or use it at work and save yourself a good few quid each month.

18185.co.uk

I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing

Hands up…How many of you back up your emails on a regular basis?

I didn’t for the longest time but then a heart in mouth moment occurred when I thought that I had lost them all in one stupid press of a delete button. That prompted me to look for an automated solution so that I didn’t have to worry about any future catastrophes. The Personal Folders Backup add in for Microsoft Outlook (versions 2002 and onwards) is brilliant and free. It creates backup copies of your .PST files (basically your email account ) at regular intervals, making it easy to keep all of your Outlook folders safely backed up. You can choose when you want it to back up your emails – personally I do it every day. Well worth doing now before you regret it at some point in the future?

Get it here: www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=8B081F3A-B7D0-4B16-B8AF-5A6322F4FD01&displaylang=en

While I am talking about emails and specifically Microsoft Outlook I thought I would share something else that you may find useful. There are occasions where you may need to send someone a large file…too large perhaps for them to receive by email (usually over 5mb but some accounts restrict attachments to 2mb). I rarely need to send massive files (video, audio, large documents) but occasionally emergencies arise where a file needed to be with someone ‘yesterday’ and they can’t wait to get it in the post but it is too large to email by traditional methods…. you have probably been in a similar situations yourself at some point.

The YouSendIt Plugin for Outlook lets you send these larger files (up to 100mb!) through your Outlook account and you can choose when to use it, what file size you deem to be large enough for it to take over the sending of attachments and so on. You can even use it even if you don’t use Outlook to send large files to another person. Just sign up for the free Lite account then download the Outlook Plugin – www.yousendit.com/cms/plugin-outlook

Let’s all meet up in the year 3000

A simple idea that I thought was worth sharing

The last two bands that I have gone along to see live in concert, Counting Crows and Ryan Adams have both done something that is becoming increasingly popular – they both recorded their concerts and made them available the next day via their websites for fans to download and keep. I think this is a nice touch and gives added value to the price of the ticket….

Translating this to more formal work life, its common now for event organisers to record keynote speeches and then pop them on to websites at a later date (indeed VAE have done this in the past – see this section of our website).

This week though I saw someone record a speech they were giving on their mobile phone which they then immediately uploaded to their website / blog as soon as they had finished so that people unable to attend could listen. I not only thought it was a really good idea that was worth sharing with you but I will also be trying it out myself next time I’m at an event. Be warned!

And just if you have the time or the inclination, take a look at this stunning video. A Victorian theatrical trick of the light ‘Peppers Ghost’ has been given a modern makeover – how long before we will all be giving speeches without having to leave our own office never mind recording them on mobile phones? – www.musionmedia.co.uk/Berlin_Telepresence.html

All I want for Christmas is…

I think I have mentioned in a previous post that Voluntary Arts England operate a paperless office policy meaning that we do everything that we can to reduce paper usage. This in turn has allowed us to work much more efficiently and effectively.

One of the many ways that we reduce paper usage is by using laptops that allow us to handwrite directly into the screen, instantly turning our notes into typed documents. This is really useful for say general note taking or taking minutes at meetings – I never have to then go away and re type anything.

Not every one has laptops though and even fewer have these tablet versions that let you write directly into the screen. Something caught my eye this week on Channel Five’s The Gadget Show though. The Digiscribble – which I had seen briefly in action before but had buried deep in the back of my mind – is a small gadget that clips on to the top of your note pad (size A4 and downwards) and it monitors your pen strokes and stores the information, recording what you have written. You then plug the Digiscribble into your computer via the USB socket and can either view your notes in your own handwriting as an image file or convert the notes and save them as a Word file or equivalent which you can then edit. I did a quick search on Google and they price at between £40 – £50.

OK, it doesn’t save on paper but it could save a lot of time.

Also if you want to find out more about Voluntary Arts England’s paperless office then head on over to our Facebook group. There’s a video on it showing the many ways that we save on paper, presented by yours truly. It was originally only intended to be shown internally so the quality isn’t exactly broadcast quality (nor are my ‘to camera’ skills) but you may find it interesting anyway – it runs for about 15 minutes.

Kudos to the person who can come up with a song inspired title to this entry about PDF files.

Just a quickie this week on creating PDF files…

For the longest time I never knew how people created PDF files – it may sound daft to those that have always known how to do it but that’s how it was. I knew that you could buy Adobe Acrobat which would let you let you create PDF files from scratch. I wanted to know though how I could, for example, save a Word file as a PDF. And my logic makes me think that if I wanted to know how to do it then there must be others out there who do too. Hence this blog entry.

Well if you have the latest version of Microsoft Office (2007) then download this add-in feature which adds a section in the ‘save as’ menu allowing you to save your files as a PDF

Or you could convert your file using this free online tool – www.freepdfconvert.com

Or get a hold of the free software package www.cutepdf.com

So now we all know!

The Wrestler

This entry is about American wrestling and wikis. Hopefully interesting, in a Hulk Hogan kind of way.

You may think it a little immature that a thirty year old man watches American wrestling every week. I make no apologies. I like it and have done on and off since I was a teen. Integral to the point of this blog entry though is my ‘allegiance’ to one of the two largest wrestling companies in the USA – TNA Wrestling (Total Non-stop Action) as opposed to the longer established, and arguably more popular WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment).

Most people I think will have visited or at the very least be aware of Wikipedia the free online encyclopedia that anyone can edit? I am a frequent visitor – where else can you learn things like the term Geek “once referred to a carnival performer often billed as a wild man whose act usually includes biting the head off a live chicken, bat, snake or bugs”. Sometimes when I have nothing better to do with my time (sometimes even when I do) I like to read Wikipedia biographies of individual wrestling stars from yesteryear. It’s amazing how many of them have had spectacular falls from grace. Some of their biographies remind me too of those long missed days when I truly believed that wrestling was real (and before you say it no, not last year!)

While I often read Wikipedia pages on a range of other topics also, it had never in a million years occurred to me that I could add or change anything on Wikipedia. That was until someone dared to claim on a page that WWE wrestling was better than my beloved TNA wrestling. In hindsight I will agree that I may have over reacted but regardless I raced for the ‘edit this page’ button and removed the offending line. I was surprised at how easy it was to do which is probably why Wikipedia is such a success.

That’s the beauty of Wiki’s in general though. Anyone can add, remove and amend information – it remembers changes so you can revert to previous versions and see who changed what and when. I have heard of some really creative uses of Wiki’s for example a creative writing group where one person wrote 100 words of a story, some one else then took over and wrote the next 100 and so on until a full book was written.

Even on a more work related basis I actually like to use wiki’s where possible. There is nothing worse than sending an email round to a large group of people to seek responses either to a document or an idea and then be flooded with emails back that you struggle to keep track of. Also seeking feedback from people via email usually means that the only person that learns is you – no one else usually ends up seeing the other person’s feedback in its rawest form. I know that when we recently redesigned the Voluntary Arts England newsletter, myself and my colleagues from the other UK nations gave feedback on its potential design and features using a wiki.

I think I am trying to make three points.

1. I like TNA wrestling
2. I think there are some creative ways that you could be using Wiki’s – you could even contribute to Wikipedia – does it feature your art or craft form or even your group?
3. Wikis are a good way to gather feedback on documents and ideas – feedback isnt lost but is stored in one central place

Take a look at this interesting time lapse video which shows the birth and growth of a Wikipedia page (the first 24 hours worth of edits to the Wikipedia entry on the 7 July 2005 London Bombings): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8O-hv3w-MU&feature=related

Create your own Wiki for any purpose – www.wikispaces.com

Oh and I almost forgot – www.tnawrestling.com

Rocking all over the world

Spotted this information earlier today in a newsletter from our broadband provider. I havent tried it myself yet but thought it looked interesting enough to share:

“PokeTalk.com, a new Web-based service, offers free 10-minute phone calls to almost anywhere in the world. At first glance, it all seems too good to be true, but the calls really are completely free and you don’t even need a microphone or headset to get started. You simply have to sign up, log in, and enter the landline number you are calling from and the one you want to connect to. Within a few seconds your phone will ring. Answer, and you will hear the number you’ve chosen being connected, just as if you’d dialled it yourself. PokeTalk is based in Israel and allows calls to over 50 countries from the UK and a dozen other locations.”

Meet me on the corner

This entry was so nearly about American wrestling and wikis. Instead it’s about organising meetings. Hopefully still interesting, just not in a Hulk Hogan kind of way.

Trying to get everyone together in the same place at the same time is not always the easiest of tasks especially if you are having to arrange lots of different meetings with lots of different people. Keeping track of who has responded, who hasn’t, who can make what date, which date looks best for everyone… the logistics can soon give even the most patient person a headache and like I say if you are having to organise numerous meetings at the same time then it becomes almost impossible to keep track.

I have started using Meet-o-Matic. In short, it lets you specify potential dates for your meeting and creates a web link which you then send round to people. They visit the link, specify which dates they can do and meet-o-matic compiles them all for you and chooses the best date(s) based on responses.

It’s really quick and easy to use and you dont have to sign up to use it.

www.meetomatic.com