Last Week I Learned... Google Hangout On Air

I hosted my first Google Hangout On-Air (at least I think it was the first time) and I had to do a bit of learning on the fly. I probably could have prepared a little bit better but I didn't know what kinds of things I would need until I got started. Here are some of the things I picked up:

1. Lower Third: If you want your name(s) and an avatar to appear like a news broadcast, you have to enable the Hangouts Toolbox and then choose 'Lower Third' You might also need to flip the image if the text looks backwards.

2. Comments: I couldn't figure out where to monitor what participants might be saying, at least not until it was too late. The comments appeared on the hangouts event page, not in the hangout window itself.

3. Q&A and other features: These seemed to be disabled for me, and I still don't know why. I need to figure that out.

You can watch (or skim through) the first event below. We'll be doing another on this Thursday.