Meeting Me

Designed for groups, made for all With Meeting Me, virtual meetings can be held with up to 15 participants. Whether it's a self-help group, a volunteer initiative, a small club or simply a group of like-minded people - here, any group can meet meaningfully and have fun at the same time. Even cross-platform, because Meeting Me is available for Android, iOS and Windows. Animated graphics instead of video stream Instead of video streaming, participants experience their meeting in video game style, controlling animated characters, communicating with gestures and movements, and walking around the room, all while exchanging ideas via audio chat! All that is needed is a microphone; a camera is not required. Create meetings easily, anonymously and free of charge Meeting Me may be used free of charge and anonymously. Registration at https://meeting-me.de is as privacy-friendly as possible. All you have to do is enter your e-mail address and user name, and you're ready to set up group meetings. The meetings can be configured extensively: What is the name of the group, when does it meet and for how long? Topic headings can be entered, which are then displayed on the whiteboard in the virtual room, and group rules and meeting structure can be defined. You can integrate your own images, which are then displayed on the virtual wall - for example, the club logo or a photo. There are four virtual locations for the meeting to choose from: Self-help contact point, mountain hut, beach and forest. Once the meeting is set up, a code is generated that you can send to the other members. They start the app and enter the meeting using the room code. The invitees do not have to register or log in, but can attend completely anonymously if they wish. Nevertheless, all participants have a unique appearance, as they are allowed to create a character (""avatar"") with an individual look before joining the meeting. How do the meetings work? Before the start of the meeting, people can talk for a while in a lounge area. Even after the meeting is over, the avatars go back there, can say goodbye and read the latest information on the notice board, just like at a real meeting. As soon as the meeting begins, it starts with a check-in round where the microphone goes around and only those can speak whose turn it is. Everyone else can only respond with gestures. This is followed by the sharing round with a previously defined topic of the day. Here all microphones are open, one can speak and gesticulate freely. When everyone has contributed something, the meeting moves to the final round for a joint feedback. At the end of the meeting, the avatars go to the lounge, where they can chat before logging out. About the creation of the app During the pandemic, many self-help groups, initiatives and associations had to learn to exchange information using video and telephone conferences. This worked sometimes more, sometimes less well. In the case of telephone conferences, there is a lack of overview; in the case of video conferences, some people find the proximity of the camera too intimate. In addition, the process and atmosphere of meetings of like-minded people (especially in the self-help sector) can only be inadequately reproduced. Together with self-help activists and volunteers, we at the KISS Stuttgart self-help contact point decided to have our own software developed that would transfer precisely this culture of conversation to digital exchange and that would be tailored to the needs of such groups in terms of functions and selection options. Meeting Me - the app for virtual group meetings - is a project of the self-help contact point KISS Stuttgart and is financially supported by the AOK Baden-Wuerttemberg. Concept and project management: Kintsugi Teapot. The software was designed and developed by the game studio Chasing Carrots. The tech agency Unterschied & Macher created the website and connection to the app.