I live in the middle of nowhere woods of Maine where i grew up. I like not having a bunch of people around. But, to keep in touch with my family and friends i use Skype. has anyone ever tried to organize a club via vid chat?
I think i would like to see if i can get a club going via vid chat and posting our GB WIP pics to each other via skype. i think you could be very specific with this type of Virtual Club re what your subject/focus is. You would not need to find 5 or 10 people in your area all interested in the same thing. they could be from anywhere…
You know, that sounds like a great idea. Will Skype handle a lot of users on one chat? That’s a lot of bandwidth being used. The wife and I use Skype quite a bit to talk to the grandkids, but that is only with us and them. Let me know if anyone esle is interested. I’d be willing to give it a go.
I like the idea very much. I have used SKYPE to teach music lessons to individuals all over the world and it’s an amazing thing. As was mentioned, I too wonder if you can do a group thing on it.
It sure would be easier to present a virtual real time WIP than using the trying Photobucket. It takes me forever to post pics that way and I don’t do much because of the hassle.
I also like the idea of verably explaining what one is doing on a kit because I’m not a great typist.
Hi Gary, Johnny, and Jay. My name’s Randy Sibley, but Sib or Sibz is the usual. At the risk of collaborating with a member of the USMC (J/K Gary! I assume from your screenname you are a Marine. I am an Army dog. But have many Marine friends and have spent a lot of time training with Marines at Pendleton.)
There’s 4 of us now, and Skype recommends an optimal number of 5 - but we won’t really know until we try it. I figure a max of 10 members in the virtual club or GB will result in about the optimal number being available at any particular time to participate in a vid chat. Also, Skype’s vid message feature will allow every member to leave a 3 minute vid any time they want to, and that can be sent to all the other members - they watch it when they can and reply when and as they like. Skype also has the cool type chat feature so that is another cool tool.
I think our first meeting should be a vid chat about what we want to start - a club or just a GB? I am favoring a club that sometimes does GBs - but always has sharing going on about their current WIPs. Military, auto, figure, whatever… The unifying theme of our club would be that we are virtual - no specific type of subject, time period, etc. - and we can look forward to regular club interaction with modellers from all over the place…
Sound good? Please add your own thoughts and ideas as we go along… BTW, if we do form a club i would like it to be leaderless and things be driven by consensus. There will still be jobs to go around, like FB page admin etc…
What are some poss names for our virtual club? “Skype Modellers”, “Bandwidth Banditos”, “Virtually Famous” ??? lolz!
OK - Gary, Jay, Johnny and Sibz - let’s exchange Skype handles and see if we can get each other added and try making a few calls. we need to exchange skype handles. i signed up via my MS Account, so just open Skype and do a search for lonemoose@live.com that will be me…
I’ll hafta look up my old screen name for my SKYPE account as I have not used it in a few years, or maybe I can just start a new one IDK.
I for one am not a big fan of GB’s because I am a very slow builder and don’t wanna be pressured into a time frame. Having said that, I really would enjoy the exchange of modeling info in real time made possible by th use of SKYPE ,especially the how-to of surmounting problems everyone encounters when modeling. "This is what I’m up against and how do you fix it " type of thing or "Wow , so that’s how you do that " Maybe I can add a few helpful tips myself. The SKYPE thing would be like going to each others’ work shop and sitting down together for modeling work shops and that’s the cool part of this great idea…
No worries Jay. I am thinking this is a club, not a GB. So, like a club, we’d have regular meetings (once or twice a month?) AND be able to leave WIP vids, or vid messages, or pics and text comments about any modelling challenge, etc etc So, no deadlines. And yes, all one of us has to do is put out the word to the other club members that we are available for ‘workshop’ on such and such day, from this time to that time. Then, go to the workbench, open your Skype, and if people call in to you during that time - there’s your meet-up…
You may be able to find your old Skype account if you attempt to register for a new one and they recognize the email address… If they dont recognize it, then yeah, i would just create a new one…
Hi, Randy. You’re correct - I’m a former Marine. I won’t hold being Army against you… 8-)). I’ll have to get with my wife about our Skype handle/screen name/whatever it’s called - she’s always taken care of that. She usually has the grandkids/kids/daughters-in-law on-line on Skype before I’m called to talk, so that’s a big reason why I have no idea what it is! I guess I should create my own account for this virtual club, so that I’m not using our account when she’s wanting to use it. I’ll let you know as soon as I get a new account/screen name going.
A little warning - my job keeps me on call 24/7 (I repair cancer treatment equipment, so, when one of my treatment units quits working, it’s Priority #01 instantly), so I might not be able to make many of the meetings, unless they happen to be on a weekend.
sounds good brother. lemme know when you have a new acct set up. i think weekends are likely days for club meetings… once we all get linked to each other via skype we’ll have that first meeting and sort out meeting times (and time zone differences) and just talk about what we think this will be. i think it’s gonna be pretty sweet because even if we arent connected live, we’re seeing vids and hearing WIP updates…
Hey Hunter. No man - no experience necessary. I also have very little experience. But I suppose like any other modeling club - and like FSM Forums - everybody, all skill levels, are welcome. I say this as the guy that proposed the idea - but i have no doubt the other 3 members of our work-in-progress-club, feel the same. do you have a skype acct? if so, what’s your email or handle associated with it? mine is lonemoose@live.com do a search in skype for that email and send an add request… i’ll be traveling for the next couple days but will be on the forums off and on. when i get to China i suspect i will beon every day or every other day… thanks for your interest…
To anbody else checking out this thread - we are 5 now. and we can add a lot more to the clubs roster.
As warned, I was pretty much gone the whole past week, including Saturday (30 Jan), so I haven’t had a chance to create a new Skype account. I’ll try to get it done tomorrow.
Hey guys - Hunter and I are Skype connected. Are you guys still interested in doing this scale modeler club? if so, let me know. if not, let me know. even if it’s just me, it’s on - so if you think of it later, drop me a line…i can help any of you get the Skype thing sorted out, let me know.
I’m just fine. It’s a mix of three things; Been out of town a lot, been very lazy when home, and my bench is a horrid mess and I need to clean house before anything happens (and I can procrastinate that for a very long time)
Gary! I assume from your screenname you are a Marine. I am an Army dog. But have many Marine friends and have spent a lot of time training with Marines at Pendleton.)