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Microsoft Office Live Meeting is a web conferencing service operated by Microsoft. Live Meeting includes software that is installed on client PCs, and uses a central server for all clients to connect to. Currently, those servers are under the control of Microsoft, however, Microsoft also produces Office Communications Server which is an enterprise conferencing server product.

Microsoft Office Live Meeting is a separate piece of software which is installed on a users PC (Windows Based Meeting Console). The software is available for free download from the Microsoft website. There is also a JAVA based console which has antecedent release functionality. This also operates in a Mac and Solaris environment.

Live Meeting is convergence software (i.e., allows integration with an audio conference). Using the web you are able to control PSTN lines (mute all parties except your own, eject parties, etc). User accounts are grouped together in Conference Centers (a unique URL) which starts with: www.livemeeting.com/cc/. . . or www.placeware.com/cc/. . . Users pay nothing to join a Live Meeting session. Charging for Live Meeting is done on an account basis. Supply of accounts is mostly done by resellers (Global Telecoms companies) who supply on a pence per minute or monthly standing charges. Telecoms companies also make a lot of money from dial-in teleconference charges.

Microsoft recently announced a Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007, which Microsoft deems a "complete event management solution" and they also announced the core feature-set for Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007. Currently a preview of Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007 will be available to current customers (Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2005).

Microsoft is offering both a hosted model for Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007 as well as a CPE (customer premise equipment) solution, namely Office Communications Server 2007. In addition to Microsoft directly hosting Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007, hosting partners will also offer Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007 as a fee-based service. Whether attendees use the Live Meeting service or the Office Communications Server 2007 (OCS 2007) to power their web conference, they will use the same client to deliver a seamless meeting experience.

Important new features are

• Rich media presentations (incl. Windows Media and Flash)
• Live webcam video
• "Panoramic video" with Microsoft RoundTable
• Multi-party two-way VoIP audio
• PSTN and VoIP audio integration
• Active speaker indicator
• Public events page
• Advanced testing and grading
• High fidelity recordings
• Personal recordings
• Virtual Breakout Rooms
• "Handout" distribution (File Transfer)

Live Meeting Web Access (MWA) was redesigned in this release to provide a user experience that is nearly identical to the new Windows-based Live Meeting client. One huge benefit is that Live Meeting Web Access is a Java applet and therefore is available on non-Windows operating systems such as Linux, Macs, etc.

Microsoft also pointed out the Microsoft Roundtable product which is a 360 degree video camera optimized to work with Microsoft Office Live Meeting 2007. One new feature included in this version involves the Microsoft Office Live Meeting client automatically switching the larger video window to the actively speaking participant. This auto-switch feature isn't specific to the Microsoft Roundtable product - it will work with any USB-based camera. The main advantage of Roundtable is its 360 degree camera view, which is great for conference rooms with several participants. With specially designed microphones, Roundtable is able to determine the location of the active speaker and then tell Microsoft Office Live Meeting which camera angle to focus on.

Live Meeting was originally a separate company called PlaceWare. Microsoft acquired PlaceWare to improve upon NetMeeting, its own webconferencing technology. Microsoft subsequently dropped development of NetMeeting.

• Live Meeting Website
• Comparison of Microsoft Office Live Meeting with other leading web conferencing solutions