Five free conferencing tools

If you need a quick and easy way to hold meetings between several people in different locations, look no further than these free online tools

  1. Oovoo
    If you have a webcam, Oovoo lets you hold online video chats with up to twelve others people for free. The big advantage over other video chat systems is that you don’t need to install any software onto your computer.
  2. Powwownow
    Running a teleconference through Powwownow costs nothing except the cost of the call. You can hold meetings with up to 50 people, record and playback calls and the system is dead easy to use.
  3. Skype
    Once you’ve installed Skype onto your computer you can hold free voice and video chats across the internet, send instant messages or make low cost national and international telephone calls. Skype is good for informal communication and brief, unscheduled meetings.
  4. Twiddla
    Twiddla reckons it’s a “web-based meeting playground”. Sounds like fun. You can create online meetings quickly and easily, share screens with each other, mark up websites graphics and photos and grab snaps of what you create.
  5. Yugma
    Yugma’s main strength is that it lets you get up to 20 people together in an online meeting for free. Once you’re there, you can talk to each other, type messages and share computer screens to work more easily together.

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