Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam

Subject: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 12 Jan 11 - 07:28 PM

A while ago we had a Paltalk music session, but things have changed.

Now Skype offers a reasonable alternative. the quality seems adequate

If you are interested, then we need to link up those with Skype.

DO NOT POST YOUR DETAILS HERE IN PUBLIC! (It's not wise to make yourself vulnerable to needless hassle.)

You can PM me if you have Skype and want to get connected, pass on your details via the chat here, or via other links such as Facebook, Myspace, etc. If you advise me of our details, I will pass them on to other interested Mudcatters. If a few friends link together and swap each others details, we can later on link up the groups as needed. Just give me time to allow me a Real Life! :-)

At the moment, I am unable to host a reliable session time, but will respect your privacy (why I ask you not to post your details publicly!) and help other Mudcat Skypers to link up.

When we have enough of a core to be able to start music sessions,we can go from there, and make further announcements.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Jan 11 - 07:33 PM

Just yesterday, I was reminiscing to my wife about our wonderful Paltalk singarounds. How much would it cost me to subscribe to Skype enough to participate in singarounds?

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: RTim
Date: 12 Jan 11 - 07:35 PM

I am not sure were you are, BUT when I Skype my kids and Grand kids in the UK, there is often a big time delay. That could be a problem!!!

Tim Radford (Northern USA)

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: RTim
Date: 12 Jan 11 - 07:38 PM

Joe - Skype is free - if you have a Web Cam!!

Tim

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 12 Jan 11 - 07:52 PM

Long Message lost... and I tried all the tricks, but could not get it back ...

You absolutely do NOT NEED a camera, but do need a mic and speakers. With no mic you can only listen, which is fine for the sessions, I suppose :-)

Available for Win and Linux (recommended to use your appropriate version of linux package manager to get it rather than the version offered on the Skype page).

Also Pidgin - version also for Windows - has a plug in to accept Skype.

Skype charges for SMS messages, connection to non-skype phones, etc - they have to make money somehow, I suppose ...

I will pass around mudcatters skype details at the moment.

Robin

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 12 Jan 11 - 07:54 PM

Delays may be due to the ISP setting a lower QoS value for Skype - they may charge you a fee for higher access rates.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: KT
Date: 13 Jan 11 - 02:21 AM

Great idea, Foolestroupe! Just last night a member of our band who was out of town, Skyped in to practice. There was a slight delay.

For her, it was great, cause she played along with what she heard, so what she was hearing and playing was in sync. From our vantage point, she was about a half measure behind us. That said, for solo purposes, as pal talk was, Skype should be just fine. FUN!

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: jeddy
Date: 13 Jan 11 - 03:49 AM

thats such a cool idea!!!!!! not sure what the difference is between yahoo webcam chat and skype though?

take care all and i might be seeing you sooner than i thought
jade x x x x x

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 13 Jan 11 - 06:38 AM

Note that the Skype software has often been described as spyware, e.g. here. The company may use your private data to send you personalized ads, or for other, unknown, purposes. Don't use Skype on a computer that contains anything secret (such as your e-mails).

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: GUEST,Geoff the Duck
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 05:52 AM

The blog accusing skype of questionable behaviour is weeks short of four years old. Other concerns came from the writers of the original software being connected with Kazaa, which installed spyware on computers, but didn't actually say skype did the same.
I cannot find any discussions more recent than 2007, and Skype has changed onwnership a couple of times since then. Newer versions have also been released.
Do you have any up to date information that suggests there may still be an active spyware concern over the current releases of skype?

We used to enjoy the Paltalk sing and chat sessions.
Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 06:13 AM

Skype puts in a toolbar for Ask.com and sets your default home page there, unless you untick the defaults on installation.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 07:14 AM

Not really what I was asking, FT.
Grishka is suggesting hidden possibly malicious additions. I am querying whether there are any known security issues with the currently available version of the software.
Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: kendall
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 08:07 AM

Why does everything have to be so damn complicated?

I've had SKYPE for years but I wouldn't know how to get connected to more than one person at a time.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Maryrrf
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 08:29 AM

Same here - I can skype face to face but how do you get a group on Skype?

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 08:52 AM

Geoff, sorry I cannot be more specific, I am just reporting rumours. The last one I heard in Oct. 2010. If you have anything to hide on your computer (such as passwords, account data, email, ...), you may want to do further research. I googled Skype spyware constrained to not older than one year; 2,400,000 hits were indicated. You must judge by yourself, I can only inform you that such rumours exist.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Fidjit
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 08:53 AM

There used to be a group button, but I can't find that now.

Chas

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: GUEST,gabe
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 09:12 AM

My techy wife tells me that you must set up a group before making a call. Then, just hit 'video call' to the group listed on your contact list. Theoretically they will all appear?
Gabe

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Jan 11 - 06:47 PM

You add a person by means of their Skype name, email, or other info - you would normally get that from them. If you PM me, I will normally pass on your details as others PM me for the moment, till we get enough of a 'clan' going.

Then 'Search' for that identity - if lucky/correct it will pop it up.

Then you need to

1) send them a 'request for contact' to establish that you both know each other and can find each other.
2) SAVE the damn thing.... or you need to to go back to the top and start again !!! ...

I did and recommend that you also next add 2 groups 'Mudcatters' to which you add all Mudcatters that you know and "Mudcat Online Session" or similar.

Then add all Mudcatters to the first, and whatever Catters want to be in on the current Jam Session to the second - you can then find all Catters, and can then only access the currently interested 'Session Goers' by opening the second group. People may want to be in or out of the Session as their lives dictate.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Janie
Date: 15 Jan 11 - 12:20 AM

Foolstroupe,

I realize this may be a really, really dumb question.

I haven't looked at or considered Skype, being a bit of a neanderthal, but a quick Google search indicates there is a version available for Macs. You know a lot more about this stuff than do I but did not mention Mac. Are Macs just not on your radar screen, or does that mean that OS X based Skype does not play well with Windows or Linux-based Skype?

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: GUEST,Dani
Date: 15 Jan 11 - 08:50 AM

Janie, I skype. If *I* can do it...

Dani

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 15 Jan 11 - 05:11 PM

Janie - the Skype site has versions for Windows (newer versions only) , Linux (but it is recommended that the newer versions are best obtained thru the normal package installation handlers with the system), and Mac - I am out of touch with Mac systems these days, but there is a version there.

I do not know how the 'group call' works with systems other than Windows, they only say that the latest Windows version handles groups.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 15 Jan 11 - 07:01 PM

I've got Skype on my Mac and rely on it to help stay in touch with my husband. He also uses it to talk to his son in Sweden and son's girlfriend in Korea. (Yes, it's a small world, nowadays.) We've had no apparent security issues.

There's no cost to get the basic Skype, which gives you calls with or without video and/or live text chat (instant messaging) to other people with Skype on their computer. Conference calls without video among people who have Skype are also no-cost. Presumably that's the plan here.

There are charges for calling to phones, or video conference calls ("group video calling"). Skype Premium includes group video calling, and you can get a subscription, or pay per day.



~ Becky in Long Beach

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 15 Jan 11 - 07:05 PM

For the messaging (text chat, rather than audio/video), only one-to-one is currently supported.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: kendall
Date: 15 Jan 11 - 07:07 PM

Kendall Morse here.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: GUEST,Dani
Date: 16 Jan 11 - 08:45 AM

you Skype, Kendall?

the world may never be the same....

Dani

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 07:40 PM

The other day I got an 'advice' from Firefox telling me that the Skype FF plugin has known errors that may cause difficulties and asking if I wanted to disable it - that was for the version I use on Win 7 FF 3.6.13

No advice as yet for Ubuntu.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: kendall
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 07:44 PM

I've Skyped for years.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Feb 11 - 09:45 PM

Time for another call for interest ...

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From:
Date: 08 Feb 11 - 10:46 PM

I'm a starter

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Artful Codger
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 12:16 AM

I found Skype to be so annoying, I uninstalled it within a day of installing it, and I'll never try it again.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: bobad
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 10:12 AM

I just got Skype and so far so good -- it's a great way to talk to people for free. An added bonus is that you can send files with no size limit through it -- great for sharing videos.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 04:59 PM

OK. I just downloaded Skype. What's the next step in creating a Mudcat group?

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 11:09 PM

We just need to swap ids - if you send me yours by PM, I'll pass it on to others (I trust) who ask - unless you REALLY don't want me to do that. I have a couple - I suggest that we should not publicize them openly - for obvious reasons.

Once we have the ids of each other we can set up a group call. It might be an idea to work out a day and time if you want a setup like the paltalk group mike used to run ... :-)

I tend not to be 'online' permanently so I won;t normally show up - but if you have other's ids, you show up in their list when you connect when they are online before you.

Once we get a fair percentage setup, the thing will just mushroom, according to the statistical maths ... :-)

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 09 Feb 11 - 11:11 PM

Oh yeah - like the old paltalk setup - it would be nice to have - god forbid, I as an anarchist actually SAY this - an organizer ... sigh ... who will be running a 'regular' session and then others can contact them...

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 10 Feb 11 - 02:21 AM

Don't know how the music side would work as when I SKYPE with my daughter in the US (I am in UK) there is a significant delay in the audio compared to the video or vice versa. Been a while since I SKYPED because I find it more nuisance than merely chatting in text or ringing her on the phone.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 12 Feb 11 - 06:03 PM

Well, I for one, think it' a splendid idea. I've downloaded Skype, dusted off my microphone, and am rarin' to go. If anyone is interested, PM your Skype ID and some idea of what time of day (or night) you'd like to join a Mudcat Cyber-singaround.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: kendall
Date: 12 Feb 11 - 07:21 PM

I guess mine would be Kendall Morse

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: kendall
Date: 12 Feb 11 - 07:23 PM

I'll be on Skype for a while.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 12 Feb 11 - 07:36 PM

There are 3 "Kendall Morse" entries...

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From:
Date: 20 Feb 11 - 06:52 PM

It's being hard to get a Skype group going.

We have a group of six but seldom more than two at a time available.

There are a whole lot of folks I'd hoped to see in here :

Big Chuck, Mid Chuck, Ivan, Naeman, Noreen, Kat, Micca, the Ducks, Toledo, DW, Jon, Bugsy, Nynia, Alison, Liz the Squeak, Morticia, Geo Broon, lanfranc, mmario, Nutty and all the rest...........Where are you?

If anyone is interested, PM me with a Skype name and we'll take it from there.

Jack (aka scalliwag on Paltalk)

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Feb 11 - 07:01 PM

Susan of the DT here has contacted me - I have passed on to her all previous skype contacts give to me, expect her to contact you all by Skype when she can. She has no camera, but does have a mic - personally I don't see that for music purposes, cameras are really essential ... :-)

Dick Greenhaus is around too .. :-)

There are 3 different "Kendall Morse" entries... don't know which one is correct, so haven't yet established contact.

Currently I can't guarantee a definite time when I am available, life is in constant flux here at this time. :-)

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Rapparee
Date: 20 Feb 11 - 07:10 PM

I'm in.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: GUEST,kendall
Date: 20 Feb 11 - 08:11 PM

I'm on Skype now

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: kendall
Date: 20 Feb 11 - 08:15 PM

Hello

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From:
Date: 20 Feb 11 - 08:47 PM

There are a couple of rapparees on skype. PM me with your id

Jack

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 12:11 AM

Kendall-
please try giving me a call on Skype- I'm dickgreenhaus1

I haven't been able to get in touch with you.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Susan of DT
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 06:16 AM

Several of you posted here and did not send your info to Foolestroupe

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: My guru always said
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 07:45 AM

I've been watching this thread from time to time and was quite interested until I saw the post about 'time delay' - is there a getaround for that?

Not on Skype, but it's a possibility, I'd like to hear other Catters!

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 03:38 PM

"saw the post about 'time delay' - is there a getaround for that?"

Not until Quantum Physics makes more advances, I suspect... Some delay may be caused by your ISP setting a low QoS (Quality of Service) on such traffic, I don't know what ISPs would do this or how to improve it, etc. Some ISPs are wanting people to pay for such 'improved services' too, I suppose.

I remember talking to my US relatives years ago on landline phone with delays of a couple of seconds. If you are - like the old Paltalk sessions - all listening to one performer in turn I don't see how that is much of a problem. I don't think it is possible to have simultaneous 'sessions with people performing simultaneously' until progress happens with laws of physics involving the speed of light over large terrestrial differences! :-)

I do know that there are some advanced SW packages in development to allow musos to sync performances over the web, but I know nothing about them, I think they are in development for Linux systems only.

Skype, for what it does, is free, and works sufficiently. You can pay for advanced Skype features.

I know Skype details of 6 of us and have passed that info on - I know of about a dozen other mudcatters who allegedly have Skype, but I do not have their precise connection details - just searching can reveal many spurious responses, and sometimes multiple responses for an individual who appears to have signed up more than once, so I can't guess which contact is your current correct one.

The Paltalk system effectively died (for me) when they no longer supported Win98 - I do not know if they deal with Mac, or Linux - it also seemed to end up as just a massive number of porn channels too... :-)

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 03:41 PM

Grishka said "Note that the Skype software has often been described as spyware, e.g. here. "

My Ubuntu is running on an AMD chip - which the post said could not happen - so it can't be trying to read the BIOS on my system to get the INTEL chip ID.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From:
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 05:02 PM

Gidday My Guru,

any time delay is one way. That is , if one person is singing the delay is at the start then the song is heard without delay
I hope this makes sense to you.

Jack

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: My guru always said
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 05:05 PM

It does, Jacko, and thank you for the succinct explanation. Thanks too, Fooles for your expertise.

Maybe one day I'll join you all, could be fun!
Hils

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: skarpi
Date: 21 Feb 11 - 06:12 PM

shæsss what a great idea :O) hang on I ´ll get connectic soon .
kv Skarpi

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 23 Feb 11 - 02:12 PM

Just got an e-mail from Skype today about expanded group video access with the latest upgrade. However, it looks as though "At least one person on the call needs Skype Premium or a group video subscription from Skype Manager." And everyone needs to have the upgrade to Skype 5.0.

A day pass can be purchased for €3.49/day (for some reason it's giving me Euros and not dollars!), or €5.99/month (with discounts for signing up for 3 or 12 months at a time).

So, if someone wanted make a date with folks and pay the fee for the group, you could have video, too!

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Apr 11 - 04:25 AM

Refresh for any who are interested.

Subject: RE: Tech: Mudcat Skype Music Chat and Jam
From: kendall
Date: 08 Apr 11 - 07:11 AM

Middle initial is E