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We found the current slack pricing to be way too expensive for us, but if/when they add video conferencing that equation changes drastically. Like you said, we

We found the current slack pricing to be way too expensive for us, but if/when they add video conferencing that equation changes drastically. Like you said, we are willing to pay, but for about $7 per user we aren't getting much more than the free plan...

AndrewUnmuted 11y ago
Slack has a pretty nice integration with appear.in. It's a free in-browser video conferencing service. We've used it with Slack very effectively in the past!
- Klathmon 11y ago
  That looks nice, but we need more than 8 participants. We are an entirely remote company, and we found that videochat during our standups really helps. Currently we are paying $5 a month per user for Google apps and only using a very small portion of it (basically just the video chatting), and they allow up to 25 people which is perfect for us.
  - austinsharp 11y ago
    Entirely remote startup employee here: we routinely have meetings with 15-30 people and we use Sococo[1] for all our audio and video. The office layout is also really nice. Everything else we've tried for video hasn't cut it, in comparison. Note that Sococo will try to push you to their new browser based product. Last time we tried it, it was far worse than the 'classic' version we still use. But they don't really show 'classic' on their website anymore. [1] https://www.sococo.com/ https://www.sococo.com/
    - a_small_island 11y ago
      >we routinely have meetings with 15-30 people That sounds horrible.
      - Klathmon 11y ago
        (I'm not the guy you replied to but...) It's not bad when everyone knows what they are doing. You get the occasional feedback screech or something, but for the most part we aren't animals and we all know how to mute our mic's. And the added benefit of a face means you can get more body-language which helps prevent the "talking over" that happens on conference calls. Plus the way we have it setup now we can all "mute" one another, so if someone is causing an issue and doesn't know it (or stepped away for a second) we can instantly mute them and move on.
        a_small_island 11y ago
        So it's like a webinar scenario where only 1 or 2 principals or are all present supposed to participate?
        Klathmon 11y ago
        No we are all participating, but we only talk one at a time mostly. It works surprisingly similar to a real meeting. Someone runs it, and everyone else participates when they need to.
    - Klathmon 11y ago
      I'll need to check this out. We really don't like hangouts, and this could be our fix.
ihuman 11y ago
Discord, a Slack competitor, is planning on adding video calls https://blog.discordapp.com/upcoming-feature-preview-friends-list/ https://blog.discordapp.com/upcoming-feature-preview-friends...
- mbilker 11y ago
  Though Discord is targeted towards gaming. I use both and found there are differences that are important, especially in the realm of notifications, themeing, and integration with other services.
  - andkenneth 11y ago
    Yeah discord really isn't even suitable for gaming community staff, it's really best as a gathering place for your team/clan/community rather than a place to get real work done. We still use slack for admins/devs/other staff. One of my biggest complaints is the lack of easy to manage private channels. There's a super complex and powerful permissions system quite obviously based on mumble, but if I want to make a quick private channel to talk to two people, it's easier to make a whole new server than just another channel.
    - jhgg 11y ago
      Group chats are coming soon that will allow you to do this quickly & easily.
koolba 11y ago
> Like you said, we are willing to pay, but for about $7 per user we aren't getting much more than the free plan... In comparison to a free plan sure but in what real business is $7/user/mo too expensive for anything? That's less than an hour's minimum wage[1]. [1]: Technically it's quite a bit less as min wage in the U.S. is $7.25 and that doesn't include corporate payroll tax or medicare/social-security matching
- justJanne 11y ago
  > in what real business is $7/user/mo too expensive for anything? The whole Open Source community? Volunteer driven, donation funded projects? Non-Profit charities, mostly composed out of volunteers?
  - koolba 11y ago
    > The whole Open Source community? Volunteer driven, donation funded projects? Non-Profit charities, mostly composed out of volunteers? None of those are businesses. Maybe I should have clarified but I meant a business as one where employees work for an organization that derives value from their work (say $A), the organization pays the employees some form of compensation ($B), and the expectation is that the value derived by each employee is more than the compensation (i.e $A > $B). In that model I don't see many places where ($A - $B) < $7.
    - justJanne 11y ago
      Yes, they aren't for-profit entities. But they still require history, easy to use chat systems, easy integration into Dev systems, etc. That's what was better about IRC: you can self-host and get all of slacks features for very cheap.
      - tempestn 11y ago
        And you still can, right? There are still plenty of alternatives for those who can't or don't want to pay for Slack.

AndrewUnmuted 11y ago

Slack has a pretty nice integration with appear.in. It's a free in-browser video conferencing service. We've used it with Slack very effectively in the past!

Klathmon 11y ago
That looks nice, but we need more than 8 participants. We are an entirely remote company, and we found that videochat during our standups really helps. Currently we are paying $5 a month per user for Google apps and only using a very small portion of it (basically just the video chatting), and they allow up to 25 people which is perfect for us.
- austinsharp 11y ago
  Entirely remote startup employee here: we routinely have meetings with 15-30 people and we use Sococo[1] for all our audio and video. The office layout is also really nice. Everything else we've tried for video hasn't cut it, in comparison. Note that Sococo will try to push you to their new browser based product. Last time we tried it, it was far worse than the 'classic' version we still use. But they don't really show 'classic' on their website anymore. [1] https://www.sococo.com/ https://www.sococo.com/
  - a_small_island 11y ago
    >we routinely have meetings with 15-30 people That sounds horrible.
    - Klathmon 11y ago
      (I'm not the guy you replied to but...) It's not bad when everyone knows what they are doing. You get the occasional feedback screech or something, but for the most part we aren't animals and we all know how to mute our mic's. And the added benefit of a face means you can get more body-language which helps prevent the "talking over" that happens on conference calls. Plus the way we have it setup now we can all "mute" one another, so if someone is causing an issue and doesn't know it (or stepped away for a second) we can instantly mute them and move on.
      - a_small_island 11y ago
        So it's like a webinar scenario where only 1 or 2 principals or are all present supposed to participate?
        Klathmon 11y ago
        No we are all participating, but we only talk one at a time mostly. It works surprisingly similar to a real meeting. Someone runs it, and everyone else participates when they need to.
  - Klathmon 11y ago
    I'll need to check this out. We really don't like hangouts, and this could be our fix.

ihuman 11y ago

Discord, a Slack competitor, is planning on adding video calls https://blog.discordapp.com/upcoming-feature-preview-friends-list/ https://blog.discordapp.com/upcoming-feature-preview-friends...

mbilker 11y ago
Though Discord is targeted towards gaming. I use both and found there are differences that are important, especially in the realm of notifications, themeing, and integration with other services.
- andkenneth 11y ago
  Yeah discord really isn't even suitable for gaming community staff, it's really best as a gathering place for your team/clan/community rather than a place to get real work done. We still use slack for admins/devs/other staff. One of my biggest complaints is the lack of easy to manage private channels. There's a super complex and powerful permissions system quite obviously based on mumble, but if I want to make a quick private channel to talk to two people, it's easier to make a whole new server than just another channel.
  - jhgg 11y ago
    Group chats are coming soon that will allow you to do this quickly & easily.

koolba 11y ago

> Like you said, we are willing to pay, but for about $7 per user we aren't getting much more than the free plan... In comparison to a free plan sure but in what real business is $7/user/mo too expensive for anything? That's less than an hour's minimum wage[1]. [1]: Technically it's quite a bit less as min wage in the U.S. is $7.25 and that doesn't include corporate payroll tax or medicare/social-security matching

justJanne 11y ago
> in what real business is $7/user/mo too expensive for anything? The whole Open Source community? Volunteer driven, donation funded projects? Non-Profit charities, mostly composed out of volunteers?
- koolba 11y ago
  > The whole Open Source community? Volunteer driven, donation funded projects? Non-Profit charities, mostly composed out of volunteers? None of those are businesses. Maybe I should have clarified but I meant a business as one where employees work for an organization that derives value from their work (say $A), the organization pays the employees some form of compensation ($B), and the expectation is that the value derived by each employee is more than the compensation (i.e $A > $B). In that model I don't see many places where ($A - $B) < $7.
  - justJanne 11y ago
    Yes, they aren't for-profit entities. But they still require history, easy to use chat systems, easy integration into Dev systems, etc. That's what was better about IRC: you can self-host and get all of slacks features for very cheap.
    - tempestn 11y ago
      And you still can, right? There are still plenty of alternatives for those who can't or don't want to pay for Slack.