Conference Calling Options|Teleconferencing Options by Daiv Russell

Every business today, whether small or a global enterprise, has tried conference calling here and there. If conference calling is new to you, you might be curious what conference call services are available. This article will strive to enumerate and explain the various conference calling services offered in the marketplace today.
The business world will never be the same, thanks to conference calling services. Now it just takes one person to run global business operations and he can do it from his office. It is possible to communicate with clients, associates, and partners, at the same time, and each person can be located in a separate city, state, or country. This is a great way to lower travel costs and other incidental costs, like catering, that go along with having meetings.

The three most important types available today are web conferencing, video conferencing, and audio conference calling.

Audio conferencing is the most popular among these. The reason this type of teleconference is used is that most people are familiar with it and it works out economically for the company. A telephone is all that is required to run an audio conference. The downside, however, as pointed out by most companies affected, is that they cannot see the person at the other end. This method also does not enable one to download images or any data while the conference is going on.

Of the three, web conferencing is the newest innovation. In a modern web conference a webcam, a camera connected to a computer, allows the conferees to see and hear each other as voice and picture are transmitted over the internet. The participants have both visual and spoken communication, and can transmit files and data so they may be made available to everyone in real time. This audio and video interaction, together with the ease of sharing data, is the compelling advantage to web conferencing.

Video conferencing is the third type of service we will discuss. With video conferencing, generally a room is specially prepared with video and audio equipment. Some of the equipment can be quite elaborate and expensive. A large formal system can accommodate dozens of individuals and be complex enough to have guided camera mounts for close-ups. A small system may be composed of a screen and a set camera mount. In either case there are some drawbacks to the video conferencing venue. The participants involved in the conference must be gathered to a single location at a specific time; input is serial rather than parallel with everyone waiting for the other to speak and generally the format is not very intimate. Additionally the relay time between conference points is often rather lengthy thereby causing a time delay in communications much like an old two-way radio.

From: http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=814373