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blog Remote Research

Remote Tasting, or: We Brought Mike to Lunch


We wanted a way to include our B|P homie Mike in our holiday lunch, but he works from London now, and flying him out just for lunch seemed a tad much. So instead, we decided to bring him with us remotely. All we needed was one laptop with a big-ass battery, one EVDO revA card, two skype accounts w/ the new MPEG4 video codec, one booster to place at his chair so the laptop would be at table level, and one friendly waitress at the Slow Club, in San Francisco.

Mike and his wife Natalie ate Indian food at the same time we ate our lunch, and we could barely hear what he said during lunch but it was overall awesome. Seriously. Full set of photos on flickr


Categories
Best Practices blog Remote Research

HOW-TO Use UserVue Internationally

At the clubs, people are always asking the same thing: “I love UserVue for remote user research, but I hate that I can’t use it internationally!” For those unhappy party people, here is a guide to dialing internationally with UserVue.

WHAT YOU NEED:

  • Desk phone
  • Computer w/ Skype and UserVue
  • Microphone headset for the computer
  • Moderator
  • Twix brand chocolate bar

LET’S DO THIS:

STEP 1:

Download and register for an account.

STEP 2: Login to Skype and start a UserVue session, like normal.




STEP 3:

Click “Call” in UserVue.


STEP 4:

Put your desk phone number in as Your Phone Number put the Skype call-in number as Participant’s Phone Number, and then click “Dial”.



STEP 5: Have the first Twix bar (there are two to a package). You’ll need the energy for the next few steps.


STEP 6:

Pick up your desk phone when it rings, and then dial “1” when the cold mechanical voice prompts you.

STEP 7:

Answer the call in Skype. Your desk phone will be connected to your Skype line.

STEP 8:

Mute and silence the desk phone. You won’t be speaking through it at all.

STEP 9:

In Skype, click Add Caller, and enter the participant’s number. If the built-in nternational line menu doesn’t work for any reason, then try setting the country to US and then typing in 011, the desired country code, then the participant’s number. Click Call.

STEP 10:

When the user picks up, you win. Direct him/her through the UserVue process like normal.

STEP 11:

Consume the second Twix bar–you’ve earned it. (There should be no more Twix bars. If you still have a Twix bar remaining by the end of this study, then you did it wrong, and the police will already be on their way to your house.)

(OR JAIL)

A WORD OF WARNING

Though it works and you can usually talk to your users just fine, there is a drop in the sound quality of the UserVue recordings. Also, the usual caveats apply when calling internationally with Skype, i.e. it drops out sometimes. You have been warned.