FACEBOOK ROOMS (VIDEOCONFERENCE SERVICE)

I recall not too long ago videoconferencing was still a novelty.  The technology just wasn't there.  You can do text chat fine but as soon as you turn on the video option, you can see the jerky motion, maybe eventually the chat software would crash too.  Nowadays, I regularly FaceTime with colleagues or headhunter.  Talk about a computer in your pocket.

Of course Zoom is all the rage these days, warts and all.  Being a frugal guy, I also made the jump to Jitsi Meet to see how useful it is.  Free is good, right?  No time limit, no registration whatsoever.  I even found out recently someone made a tele-health package based on Jitsi.  The sky is the limit!

Today I checked out Facebook Rooms, Facebook's answer to all this video-conferencing craze.  It's built into Facebook and Facebook is the king of social media, you cannot go wrong!  Well, in my particular case, I could use some more participation, but that's another story.  There is a limit of 8 people max per room and it wasn't an issue for me.  I had only one other participant and his window took up the center of the screen while mine sits in the lower right.  Very simple interface - the row of buttons in the screenshot is all you get.  Share Screen, See Participants, Mute Video, Mute Audio, and Hang Up.  I sure miss having a text chat window, but maybe Facebook figured many people cannot type or spell anyway, there's no need for a texting feature.  No background picture or video, either.  No background blurring as well.  Note the Gear icon in the upper right?  That's just Settings, and a bunch of keyboard commands.

I find Facebook Rooms feature-lacking.  Too simple.  What's with the eight-people limit?  I cannot see myself using it again in the future.