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kiwifidget

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#289417 4-Sep-2021 14:39
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Hi, 

 

My local club is looking into using Teams for holding virtual meetings considering we cannot meet in person until we reach covid level 1 again.

 

We have about 60 members. We typically meet twice a month, with a meeting lasting about 2 hours.

 

I read here https://www.microsoft.com/en-nz/microsoft-teams/free

 

that meetings are limited to 60 minutes, but there is an extension to this at the moment.

 

     

  • Built-in online meetings and audio and video calling for individuals and groups, with a duration of up to 60 minutes per meeting or call. For a limited time, you can meet for up to 30 hours.
  • Meet for up to 60 minutes in the free version of Microsoft Teams. To support our customers during COVID-19, we’ve extended this limit to 30 hours until further specified.

Does anyone know if this still means meetings are limited to 60 minutes, but you can have 30 1 hour meetings.

 

Or the individual meeting duration limit is removed and you can have up to 30 hours of meetings?

 

Thanks.





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alexx
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  #2772059 4-Sep-2021 14:52
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The answer appears to be in the fine print:

 

1. To help you stay connected in the coming months, you will be able to meet for 30 hours with up to 300 participants until further specified.





#include <standard.disclaimer>




kiwifidget

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  #2772061 4-Sep-2021 14:56
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@alexx  Maybe I'm being a bit blond, but I still dont see how that specifies what the time limit is for any one meeting.

 

No limit, so you can have say 5 6-hour meetings, or is the limit still 1 hour meaning you can have 30 1hour meetings?





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timmmay
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  #2772066 4-Sep-2021 15:05
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Try it with one other person and see. I think it's unlimited length meetings based on that wording.




alexx
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  #2772075 4-Sep-2021 15:15
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The key words here appear to be "until further specified". You can probably hold a meeting for more than one hour, but if that feature becomes too popular for the free version, they will start limiting it.

 

Just like timmmay said, try it with one person and you'll know the answer.





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tanivula
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  #2772106 4-Sep-2021 15:36
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Get someone in your club, that has an office 365 sub at work, to 'host' the meeting?


kiwifidget

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  #2772114 4-Sep-2021 15:46
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tanivula:

 

Get someone in your club, that has an office 365 sub at work, to 'host' the meeting?

 

 

No one in our club has a work 365 sub.

 

I have a Family365 sub if that's any use?





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chevrolux
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  #2772116 4-Sep-2021 15:49
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Yea why doesn't the club just buy a 365 "Business Standard license for $18?

Or just grab a user for something like Lifesize (https://www.lifesize.com/en/pricing/) and host off that?

Or if you only needed 25 people on a meeting, 3CX Standard is free and has WebMeeting. Just need to spin it up on a $5/month amazon server.

 
 
 

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kiwifidget

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  #2772120 4-Sep-2021 15:58
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chevrolux: Yea why doesn't the club just buy a 365 "Business Standard license for $18?

 

Just googled that.

 

Its NZ$18.90 user/month excl GST.

 

Would that require us to pay $21.75 times 60 every month?

 

Or just one user buys the std license and then can invite the other people (who may or may not have any sort of MS sub) for free?

 

The club already has an Office365 Personal sub for running Microsoft Office on its laptop, so this would be on top of that, or would replace that?





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chevrolux
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  #2772126 4-Sep-2021 16:12
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Yea just buy one license, and then everyone else can be invited as a guest to the meeting hosted by that user.

CYaBro
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  #2772130 4-Sep-2021 16:20
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Would the club be eligible as a non-profit / charity and get some 365 licenses for free by donation?




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kiwifidget

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  #2772132 4-Sep-2021 16:22
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CYaBro: Would the club be eligible as a non-profit / charity and get some 365 licenses for free by donation?

 

I would have to look into that. I'm not sure what our legal status is charity-wise.

 

 





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kiwifidget

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  #2772134 4-Sep-2021 16:25
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One license is good news.

 

But even at $21.75/mth that's dearer than the $90-ish /yr we pay for the personal sub.

 

We'll persevere with the free version for now as I did find this mention here...

 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/getting-started-with-meetings-in-teams-free-f307d79a-11ce-47e3-91ac-f5f615c7572a#:~:text=Go%20to%20Meetings%20on%20the,re%20ready%2C%20hit%20Join%20now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 





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kiwifidget

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  #2773462 7-Sep-2021 11:31
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Hooray - managed to have a meeting with 9 people this morning.

 

Some weird things hopefully someone here can help with.

 

1. The chat icon was missing for 5 people. Googling suggests this was an issue last year, perhaps not resolved yet?

 

2. I could see all other 8 participants on my screen, others could only see some, and it changed around depending on who was talking.

 

3. #2 could have been remedied I think by "together mode" or "large gallery" but not everyone had those options. And when we have larger meetings that would be silly, so how do you flick through to see everyone even if its not all at once?

 

4. Some people were displayed as Guests and some were not. Do not know why. One of the guests was able to use chat so that's not the reason for #1.

 

Reminder, we are using the Free version of Teams.

 

None of these issues are deal breakers, but its good to know what to expect when we hold larger meetings and what we can and cant rectify.





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CYaBro
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  #2773468 7-Sep-2021 11:42
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kiwifidget:

 

One license is good news.

 

But even at $21.75/mth that's dearer than the $90-ish /yr we pay for the personal sub.

 

We'll persevere with the free version for now as I did find this mention here...

 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/getting-started-with-meetings-in-teams-free-f307d79a-11ce-47e3-91ac-f5f615c7572a#:~:text=Go%20to%20Meetings%20on%20the,re%20ready%2C%20hit%20Join%20now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can get the Microsoft 365 Business Basic plan at @ $8.74 per month and that includes MS Teams, along with a 50GB email account and 1TB of OneDrive/Sharepoint storage.

 

 





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tanivula
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  #2773486 7-Sep-2021 11:53
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CYaBro:

 

 

 

You can get the Microsoft 365 Business Basic plan at @ $8.74 per month and that includes MS Teams, along with a 50GB email account and 1TB of OneDrive/Sharepoint storage.

 

 

 

 

I think the problem with this is that it would be Office personal sub + M365 basic (as they want desktop software).


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