Livestream to Facebook

[JayneBagshaw]

I heard that this would no longer be an option from April - is this true and what will the alternative be please?

[Kristina16marie]

Exactly the info I’m trying to find out also. It’s strange that I can’t find anything about this from zoom. 

[Ray_Harwood]

@JayneBagshaw and @Kristina16marie,

Don’t know where you heard this, but I certainly haven’t heard anything from Zoom that live-streaming to Facebook will be affected in any way. Can you point to the source of this info, so I can research??

[Kristina16marie]

This announcement from the Facebook developers: https://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/2024/01/23/introducing-facebook-graph-and-marketing-api-v1...

if you scroll down to the section marked Depreciation & Breaking Changes it says permissions that allow publishing to groups will be removed from all versions:

Deprecating Facebook Groups API

The Facebook Groups API is deprecated in v19 and in 90 days will be removed from all versions. This deprecation includes all Permissions (publishto_groups, groups_access_member_info) and Reviewable Features (Groups API) associated with the Facebook Groups API. 

———

If this change does not affect zoom’s ability to stream directly into a private Facebook group, that would be wonderful but I haven’t heard one way or another. Thanks so much for looking into this! 
PS - I had to remove the underscore between the words “publish” and “to” in the developer code because the community standards think I’m trying to say a bad word. 😆 

[Ray_Harwood]

Thanks for the info, @Kristina16marie.  I actually found some of that later yesterday when doing some more research. 

For clarification... this isn't a Zoom restriction, it's a Facebook restriction, and apparently only affects livestreaming to GROUPS, not to Facebook in general.

I watched the YouTube video in the link @Lisa-11 posted in her reply.  I highly recommend watching it... it has "the solution", and while the speaker (I think her name is Lisa, but probably not the same Lisa as Lisa-11 on this thread) does a GREAT job explaining how to get around it, I still think the average user might get confused somewhere along the way.

This blurb might help...

The issue, I think, is that allowing a third part app to access a Facebook group allows that app to see some things that you probably don't want the app to see.  I'm pretty sure Zoom plays nice with your Facebook group and doesn't steal information about who the members are, etc, but we all know "not everybody is nice." So removing the third part app's ability to access the group is being removed for security purposes.

But many people might not know that there is a way to stream to almost any stream-able service by using the "Custom RTMP" approach.  What is this?  Without going into the details, let's just say that the "third party app" negotiates the RTMP codes behind the scenes, so you don't have to deal with it.  Kind of like "going on autopilot".  The "Custom RTMP" approach requires you to do a couple of things, all of which are explained in the YouTube video in detail:

• First, you need to ensure that your Zoom account is enabled to use the Custom RTMP approach to streaming.
• Secondly, you have to go into wherever you are streaming from (in your case, Facebook Groups), and grab the two RTMP codes you need.
• Next, you have to paste those RTMP codes into Zoom in the appropriate place for your Zoom meeting or webinar.
• Lastly, when you're ready to stream, select "Live on Custom Streaming Service" instead of "Live on Facebook":

There's plenty of information on the Zoom Support site about using Custom RTMP:

https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/article?id=zm_kb&sysparm_article=KB0064210

As with most things -- especially things like Zoom and livestreaming -- I recommend testing it out in advance.  Make a new, private group that you can use to test things -- test, fail, try again, repeat, repeat, repeat.  Eventually you think you have it down... then go to your "real" group and test one more time (there might be a difference somewhere you hadn't accounted for!).

Good luck!

[ToniMartin]

Hey @Ray_Harwood 

I've tried all of these steps multiple times but persistently get the same error message:

Error: Failed to connect to Zoom services

Please refresh the app and try again. Logging out of all streaming platforms and adding these channels again may solve the error. If the error persists, contact Zoom support.

Any ideas what I'm doing wrong?

[Ray_Harwood]

Welcome to the Zoom Community, @ToniMartin.

Sorry to say I get the same error consistently when using the Live Streaming marketplace app. I am able to stream using the instructions in Zoom’s Custom RTMP support article here:

https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/article?id=zm_kb&sysparm_article=KB0064210

When I have time, I’ll attempt to troubleshoot and report back if I find a solution.

[ToniMartin]

Thanks @Ray_Harwood following the instructions in the help doc did indeed work - so it is just the marketplace app that's the problem. Is there any benefit of using the app (once it's working)? Or, should I just stick with the method in the article you've shared. 

Many thanks.

[Ray_Harwood]

Hey, @ToniMartin.

I think there are some advantages to using the Live Stream app from the Marketplace. First, you can set up multiple destinations and pick which one any time; it’s unclear to me whether it will stream to multiple destinations simultaneously. It also allows you to set up a “persistent” setup where you might otherwise need to reset the parameters inside Zoom every time.

But first, we need to determine what’s keeping us from successfully setting it up. I’ll give it a fresh try in the next couple of days. 

[Lisa-11]

LIVESTREAM FROM ZOOM TO MY FACEBOOK GROUP - There is a lady on YouTube who did a video a few days ago very helpful https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_r7CW49KL8  - I would like to find out why I have been getting messages from zoom after I have installed all of the correct features and when i hit livestream I get the following message( Error: Failed to connect to Zoom services  Please refresh the app and try again.  Logging out of all streaming platforms and adding these channels again may solve the error.  If the erro persists, contact zoom support. )  I did log out of zoom, deleted the apps and started the process all over again.  Still receive the same error message.  Would like to have this solved.  Thanks