SOPHIA is experimenting with options for levering technology to build communities of philosophical conversation. One tool available to us for free is Zoom. Zoom will enable the hosting of video conference meetings with huge capacity and tools for recording meetings, among other functionalities. Joining a meeting is simple, yet it might be a good idea to watch a short video about the several ways in which one can join a SOPHIA conference call with Zoom. Before we get to that, consider the following:

It’s a good idea to test your video and audio settings in advance. If any of you would like to hold a quick call with me (ETW) to test out the connection and process, I’d be delighted to give the system as many practice runs as members would like. I think you’ll find that tools like these will 1) dramatically reduce the impediment that distance represents for our community building, and 2) archive our meetings for later viewing and sharing, so that we benefit more people and more deeply in holding our recorded meetings.

Here’s Zoom’s explanation of the process of joining a meeting:

If you have yet to join or renew your membership in SOPHIA via our new system, please take a few minutes visiting our Membership Levels page (our JOIN/RENEW MEMBERSHIP link).