Original Sound by Default

[PRM-KS]

Hello - just updated zoom today (11.02.22) and it seems like Original Sound needs to be turned on manually every time now.

For the last few months it was already always on once I did it initially ... and this was so amazing. No more messing up meetings where I share audio or workshops where we're working on music things and I just know its going to sound amazing from the beginning without the extra awkward "wait let me turn on original sound".

Is there a way for me to turn original sound on and let it be that way forever on the newest version? If not...can this become a thing please?

[keshlam]

This really is not a big ask. The functionality exists. All we're asking is the ability to set a default, in the same way we do with backgrounds and device preferences and so on. "If it happens, it must be possible."

Alternatively, allow this to be set -- either as a call-wide default, or on behalf of an individual participant -- by the call's administrator, who isn't always the one who needs the bit flipped. If you can implement the ability for an admin to mute or unmute a participant, you can implement the ability to flip them into original sound mode.

[Rayco]

In a earlier post it was stated that the Zoom Engineers had looked at this and decided that it WOULD NOT be changed. 

I have not heard a single person complain about Original Sound being ON but thousands are complaining that Zoom REMOVED a feature which made the program work better everyones life so much easier. 

Why do you not listen to the people who are paying your wagers Zoom? 

[Rayco]

New update 27th March, still no fix for this. 

ZOOM ARE NOT LISTENING TO CUSTOMERS AT ALL. 

They have however decided to beta 'Live performance audio' which also cannot be kept on. 

This feature will require a fast computer and even faster internet, a bit ahead of its time maybe.  Pointless definitely at the moment. 

They can't even get the basics to work properly. 

[keshlam]

At the very least, allow Original Sound to be set as default by the session admins, and/or to be set on behalf of participants by the admins.

We just had half an hour of online concert ruined because the admins couldn't reach the performers to get this fixed. We had similar problems in the "open mic" portions of the weekend.  Being able to do it on their behalf -- just as admins are able to mute and unmute on behalf of a participant -- would be a huge improvement.

And, yes, those of us who are mostly using Zoom for music in quiet surroundings would REALLY appreciate being able to specify that while feedback reduction is useful, noise reduction is not -- the non-voice sounds really are supposed to be there.

This _can't_ be a hard feature to add. The logic is already there, it's just a matter of invoking it from from one or two more places.

[YaBoiB]

Hello @keshlam, 

 I respectfully disagree with you about being easy to add. It is not that easy to add functionality to audio. I have asked that we add a “switch” to allow session admins to toggle on and off the ability to disable the original sound and for that switch to be static for all meetings moving forward on that account. So likely, this would be an account setting switch under the original sound that account admins can manipulate. I am still waiting for the developers’ word on whether and when they plan to add it. 

As I have stated a few times on this thread. I am following that task closely, so as soon as I know what direction we might go, I will gladly pass that information on to everyone on this thread. 

I will add that the reason why this was switched back in December was due to customer feedback. We (Zoom) did not make this change for our own reasoning. At least, that is the way that I understand why this change was made back in December of last year. I could have misread that information, but I do not think that I have. 

We (Zoom) and our CEO Eric would love to make every user happy, but that is only sometimes possible. We (Zoom) “strive” to deliver happiness to our customers. We do know that not all functionality decisions we make may seem that way, but I was informed that most customers wanted this the way it is now (as of December). That said, I agree with you all that adding a switch would be helpful, and that is why I am working with the development team to see if I can get that added to the product, but this takes time and patience. Please allow me time and patience. 

Warm Regards,

Brandon

[Rayco]

[Rayco]

I would add that if you 'thought' that was what customers wanted then you have misunderstood what they were asking for. 

Up to v.5.11 the Original Sound would not stay on  unless you actually selected the option shown in screenshot. 

Those users that wanted it off could just use the default of it being off. 

Your reason for this is wrong. 

[keshlam]

I must respectfully disagree with the disagreement. (I hope my initial overly-grumpy non-respectful note didn't come through; if it did, my abject apologies and I'll delete it.)

We are not requesting a change to the audio processing chain, which I agree is a complex area of coding.

We are requesting changes that would access the already-exposed on/off control for a feature which is already implemented.

In the local version this is a UI/initialization change, to persist the state of the original-sound control in the same way that camera, audio, and other initialization preferences are stored and reloaded.  Depending on what language you're working in, this might require a few layers of exposing the control through access scopes, but it really shouldn't be complicated unless your architecture is much hairier than I would expect.

Adding it to the controls available to the call administrators would be another layer of complexity, though. I am guessing that most or all of the other admin actions (mute/unmute, lower hand, etc.) are probably implemented by talking to the back-end software rather than passing a request through to the participant's client.  There may not be an easy way to access this control remotely without significant changes to the protocols you are using. So I grant that this one may be harder to achieve. I'm putting it forward mostly because, until we *can* make Original Sound a persistent setting, being able to fix a user who hasn't configured correctly would be a tremendously useful safety net -- and even after the setting could be made persistent, being able to help new users who don't realize they should be taking advantage of it would be highly desirable.

I realize that music isn't Zoom's primary market. But folks are using it, mostly successfully, for that purpose, and it appears to me that closing this gap would not be expensive and would be highly appreciated. I'd really like to know that it was at least accepted onto the backlog as a valid ask, even if it's prioritized behind other issues.

[Rayco]

You don't seem to accept that this function was present and worked perfectly for ALL users in Zoom version 5.11 then deleted. 

By doing this your developers made life more difficult for every single user who does music and a complete nightmare for the Hosts. Who are by and large the ones paying for a Zoom Pro account. 

Why was it taken out without consulting with anyone and also why was it done in a destructive way. 

You keep adding stupid features that on one uses but will not listen to paying customers. 

Happy to have a Zoom meeting with you anytime to show you what I mean if you cannot understand and prove what I am saying is true.  

[Khirschmann]

This is interesting.  But given the fact that the user controls were exposed in a previous version suggests that it shouldn't be that difficult to expose again.  If they wanted to move the control into the preferences/options control panel, then perhaps that might be a little bit harder.

However, you mentioned that music is not Zoom's target audience, yet they just released a beta feature for low latency audio to better synchronize musicians playing together on Zoom.  Why add a feature designed for musicians when you aren't even listening to those musicians who are asking for this feature to be reinstated.  The logic behind this and the responses we've seen from Zoom employees on this thread make absolutely no sense at all and show a total disregard to any perspective other than their own.

[Khirschmann]

Brandon,

Thank you for your continued engagement with this group.  I find the idea that users wanted to remove a checkbox that locks the setting in place seems rather ridiculous to me.  Only people who actually use Original Sound would have ever even seen this option.  I can’t think of any reason why someone who uses Original Sound would be bothered by the presence of a checkbox locking that setting in for a specific input device.  I think it’s more likely that changes to the Original Sound user interface resulted in the removal of a feature that the engineers assumed wouldn’t be missed.  I have no proof of this, but your assertion that this was requested by users seems suspect.

Kenny

[YaBoiB]

Hi Kenny, 

I understand everyone’s frustration in this thread. I do, but what has been done is done now. For whatever the reasoning was. I know you all are unhappy about the change, but I cannot do anything about the change. All I can do is “try” to improve this; I have asked the development team to add a switch to the functionality to allow you to choose which meetings have an original sound. Please know that this topic has many eyes, including my leadership. So, we are listening to you all. 

I will continue working with the team to attempt to add the switch in a future release. 

Thanks, 

Brandon

[operator]

Brandon,

I know it doesn't sound like it from some of the comments, but we REALLY appreciate your efforts.  Thank you.

[slynk]

Hi Brandon.
I'm glad I found this thread because I was tearing my hair out trying to figure out why my audio wasn't working for my student during a lesson (I teach digital music production) until I realized Original Sound was off.

When I first started doing lessons, I dug through all of the Zoom settings to get things working how I want them to for every meeting and I must have switched Original Sound to be On by Default. At some point, Zoom updated and Original Sound was now Off by default.

So now I'm tearing my hair out again trying to find the setting to reverse that change when I stumbled upon this thread.

Now I'm just dumbfounded by why Zoom would remove the option to have a Default setting for this option. It doesn't make any sense. I want my audio that I am transmitting to be Original Sound every time no matter what. I don't care what my students use. They can set theirs up however they like. But I don't understand why I, the admin of the meeting and a paying customer of Zoom, have to click this dumb button every single meeting and if I forget, the lesson is ruined.

Btw, your "Disable Audio Enhancements" workaround did not work for me as my audio hardware has no such setting.

This needs to be fixed.

Edit: For those keeping score, I'm using 5.15.5. Issue still not resolved.

[Jennife]

In the past, Zoom would remember the actions you've done in your last meeting, but now, for this feature, you have to re-open the setting every time you start a meeting.

Actually, this is especially changed to the current effect, since the likelihood of it being misused is a lot higher than people who need it to be always on.

So, this is not an issue that needs to be fixed. 

[Rayco]

I really CANNOT believe the reply you have just given Jennifer.  Are you some kind of idiot? 

People have been complaining about this feature being taken out for months and you choose you add a LAUGHING emoji to your 'Official' reply.  

There was NO REASON AT ALL to remove this feature because it did NOT impact any users who did not want Original Sound on. 

As another PAYING user I am disgusted at your reply and also the Behaviour of ZOOM on this matter. 

I WILL NOT BE RENEWING my Pro subscription..... 

[Jennife]

Hi Rayco, 

Sorry to make you feel uncomfortable with my inappropriate wording in the reply.

I just want to express that we know and care that users are complaining and discussing this feature in the community, we are not ignoring it. We want to offer the reason why we change it, that is, many users are misusing this feature, and causes many audio issues which would also affect their meeting experience.

For the scenarios that need original sound on, and if already turn on the setting before the meeting starts, we are discussing with the ENG team if we can pop a tip to remind the users to click the button in case they forget it or what else we can do to improve the meeting experience.

Thanks

[Rayco]

There is NO BUTTON and there is NO TIP that will help. 

For all the THOUSANDS or music Zoom users, some of which may not be very technically minded, it is a nightmare to have to keep switching this on each time. 

The way it was before did not have any impact on ANY other users, you don't seem to consider that many music Zoomers are ALSO business Zoom users.  

The feature to enable OS each time you log in had to be SPECIFICALLY selected, and would not have any effect at all on other users. 

The way these things are selected and implemented has always been a poor design in Zoom, you people can maybe write code but they cannot seem to design a good users interface. 

We, like many others have been looking at other alternatives to Zoom and will not be spending any more money with Zoom until this is fixed. 

[Msteele]

Adding a pop-up reminder is ridiculous. For the tens of thousands of users that always want Original Sound on, the solution is simple. I've said this before - all Zoom would need to do is add and Advanced menu option where a "normal" user would have to go out of there way to make a selection in this screen. Add the option back in to either "remember previous setting for Original Sound"  or "Always turn on Original Sound".

[operator]

Dear Jennife,

We are simply asking either for

1. A SETTING under Advanced to turn it on for our use by default.  Users can turn it off at any time for any session: leave the status on the screen, as it is now.  Users would be totally responsible for this.  If we have bad calls, it is on us.  Blame the users.

2. An ability to REMEMBER the last setting.  Again, users can turn it off at any time: leave the status on the screen, as it is now.  The onus is on us, the users!

You say turning it on "causes many audio issues which would also affect their meeting experience."  Please provide a list of those issues.  That might help us understand the reasoning of Zoom ENG and Corporate that overrides the many requests since the change was made last November of real, live, paying users of your product.  I would love to understand your reasoning!  Thank you in advance.

[Jennife]

Hi,

These days I've found the developer and PM who are responsible for this feature change, and we reviewed the reasons for making this change at the time.

This function is designed for scenarios with special needs, such as music teaching scenarios. Turning it on means that Zoom will disable process audio, such as noise suppression. We expect users who need this function to use professional musical headphones. However, according to our statistics, the vast majority of users who have enabled this function use the built-in microphone of the system, and in the meeting, once it is turned on, it is not turned off until the meeting ends which can be considered that the user has turned on this function by mistake, and their meeting will suffer from bad audio experiences such as noise and echo.

That's why we set the default value to off.
For users of the music scene, their core requirement is to have this function, despite it may not be so convenient now. We are very sorry about that, but it is our design after weighing, and it should not change again in the short term.

[Rayco]

Hi Jennife, 

Thank you for replying.  But you are still mistaken and your developers are mistaken.  

I will quite happily have a meeting with the developers and your CEO to demonstrate that FACT.  

I and others have stated above how it was in version 5.11 and earlier versions. 

Setting the Original Sound to 'DEFAULT' to being ON could ONLY be set by specifically selection a HIDDEN option. 

This would not affect ANY USERS AT ALL  unless they knew what they were doing and how to do it. 

Your statement about headphones is just WRONG, we are the people who are using the program and sitting in meetings for hours on end.  We are also PAYING FOR THE SERVICE. 

Please het your people to LISTEN to us. 

We will not be renewing our subscription until it is fixed. 

 As stated, please get someone to contact me and I will talk directly to them. 

[chantelleflx]

The default value of off is fine. We just want a setting to change it to "on" when the meeting starts, just like you can change your video to be default on or off when the meeting starts. We use this setting for the audio in our fitness classes. We use it for every single class. And we do not use headphones to teach a fitness class! Our meetings suffer from bad audio experience when the teacher forgets to turn it on. As the administrator, I want to be able to help them do their jobs and not have to worry about technology. You can bury this option as deeply as you want, like under advanced settings. Just please give us back the option we used to have!!!

[operator]

Dear Jennife,

The problem with fast-growing tech companies is that they start to assume they are the fountain of knowledge in their market.  They expect that no one but them knows about their software (which is always true) BUT they stop hearing their users.  There were no greater surprises to me as the former president of a small software company than to hear how users were finding our software vital to their needs ... but in ways we never envisioned.  The practical steps to make the software "perfect" for a user were sometimes very easy (an additional switch in advanced settings) and sometimes very hard.  Normally, after we implemented a change, we learned many others found it great for them too.  We had no idea!

What this thread is all about is what appears to be the return (not even create!) of a switch or remembered default that existed before November 2022.  Your assumptions, the PM assumptions, the developers' assumptions about how the feature is used are sadly wrong.  Read this thread! In our case, we have volunteer, non-technical people operating a system that only outputs to a PA system.  For them, even remembering to end the call and turn off the PA is sometimes a challenge.  Our documentation was changed for the operator. Two paper post-it notes (written by operators, not me) are now on the computer and workstation.  And still, we forget to turn on Original Music and our listeners complain. This is a problem for us and you have the solution!  

You ignore your users at your own peril.  One by one they (mostly-quietly) research and find a solution elsewhere.  

[YaBoiB]

Hello All, 

 We have spoken to our developers and the consensus from our customer base is that they would like the component of Original Sound to be deemed "off" by default. We have made enhancements to auto detection to assist non-technical operators as well. I have checked our road map today and there are no further enhancements for this functionality, so if you would like to provide your feedback to the Engineering teams at Zoom the page for that is zoom.us/feed. 

We thank you all for your feedback on this thread. It has been very helpful in the production of Zoom components. 

Sincerely, 

Brandon 

[chantelleflx]

Default of "off" is fine! We just want the ability to override this and set our own default to meet our particular situation. Just like you can with so many of the other meeting settings. I don't know why this is so hard for your team to understand, especially when WE USED TO HAVE THIS OPTION. The link for feedback you provided makes it sound like it is excessively complicated to provide feedback, but I will try. Not that I really believe it will do any good.

[Khirschmann]

So what I'm hearing from you Brandon is that find our feedback helpful in the production of Zoom components, but Zoom will not be considering this request in the foreseeable future.  

That's a pretty disingenuous way to let us down.

Zoom's unwillingness to listen to their clients will eventually be their downfall.  Mark my words.  Every time a platform has dominated the market and became deaf to the needs of its consumers, they were replaced by something else. 

We may not represent the majority of Zoom users, but what we have been begging for is vital for the way that we use the platform.  Between you and Jennifer, you have made it utterly clear that Zoom's project managers and developers do not even understand how these features are used by your customers, and therefore are making false assumptions which lead to bad decisions. 

I will most certainly leave feedback for your developers, and will not be holding my breath for a change that you've made perfectly clear is not coming.  And with that, I will be making the recommendation to my Yoga studio to abandon Zoom and move to Webex who still offers the feature we've been asking for. 

[doremiteacher]

THANK YOU, Khirschmann!  I just checked out Webex.  It is is simple and better for musicians! I will be leaving zoom and using Webex!  Thank you again for the referral!

[doremiteacher]

The "consensus from our customer base?"  Who?  Who are you polling?   

Anyone who wants the default to be "original sound off" can have it that way.

As has been stated MANY times,  anyone who DOES NOT want "original sound on" as the default can just leave zoom audio as is - they DO NOT have to:

- go to audio settings

- select the option to turn on original sound

- start a meeting

- click the down arrow from the original sound button

- select a microphone on which original sound will be the default

Again, WHO are these people who are going through all of these steps when they DON'T want "original sound on?"

Please put back the OPTION to have "original sound on"  as a default. 

[doremiteacher]

Please tell the development team to let US worry about the sound quality in our meetings.  If we WANT original sound on - and "misuse"  this feature, and "cause many audio issues which would also affect our meeting experience" -  that is OUR choice.  We are not children and we do not need the developers to be our Mommies and Daddies.  

[Davey]

For what it is worth... I see no logic in the removal of the option to allow original sound feature to be used on start up. It is a choice many prefer. Please Zoom, reinstate this feature.

[doremiteacher]

I agree....Webex has the option to leave "music mode" selected as default and they are not complaining about issues.... The only reason I haven't switched is because it's going to take awhile to learn Webex (shortcuts and such).  Once I get everything learned (so that I can teach smoothly with no hitches), I'm switching.

[doremiteacher]

Thank you, Brandon.  Please let the development team know that Webex has the option to make original sound the default - and they don't seem to be getting complaints.  As a matter of fact, most of my musician friends have moved to Webex for this very reason.  

We (musicians) do not WANT to make the change, but we are being forced to do so.  I am in the process of learning Webex.  As soon as I feel comfortable, I'm making the switch as well. 

Thank you for being the "go-between" in this situation.  I can not have been easy dealing with our frustration and anger.  

[kareebee]

Also remembering to turn it back on once the meeting has started and you reconnect a cable or get kicked out and it defaults to OFF. SO frustrating! People screaming at you because they can't hear the music. UGH. So unprofessional.

[Rayco]

Still no fix and not response from ZOOM, typical shoddy customer service. 

[doremiteacher]

NONE OF US (the people complaining) use headphones. 

Here's why I can't:

I am a GROUP music teacher. Most of my students are in person - with a few online.  The online student's keep themselves muted UNTIL I ask them to unmute to play for us.  If I was using headphones, the rest of the class would not be able to hear them. 

I have to push the "original sound" button for every class so that the RECORDING of the class is useable.

The online students have to push the "original sound" button so that we can hear them play when they are unmuted. 

Other people have very similar situations to me.  

You can not teach an IN PERSON GROUP with headphones on.  If people choose to join online, that is their choice. 

[Rayco]

It seems very obvious now the ZOOM are IGNORING the thousands of customers who are asking for a serious omission from the later versions to be fixed.  Despite repeated explanations of why it would no affect anyone else. 

Like many others I have decided to try WEBEX for music meetings. 

https://pricing.webex.com/us/en/hybrid-work/calling/?utm_medium=website&utm_source=wdc&utm_campaign=...

Give it a look, download and try FREE version, if you don't like it it cost you nothing. 

Maybe if the customer base drops they might start listening...... 

[dbshin]

Dear Zoom team,

This is definitely a UX issue.  The green logo with the checkmark next to "Original Sound: ..." makes it seem like it's associated with OS, and the green checkmark makes it look like it's on.  Only after toggling things here and there one realizes that the green checkmark has nothing to do with OS.  The words "On" and "Off" are easily lost when people toggle the option for "Original Sound" in the audio setting and assume it's ON.  Heck, even have a little note that says "Please toggle Original Sound ON in the meeting as it is OFF by default."  The version update that turned it off by default created massive issues for musicians everywhere.

There has to be a better visual cue/toggle for original sound.  Make the wording RED or something to better indicate it's off.  Put it away from the green checkmark logo.  Put it as a clear text-based option toggle along with where all the rest of the audio settings are (lower left icon with the microphone). 

I have discussed this with the support team and they are now aware that many users are frustrated thinking that their original sound is not working although it is due to the fact that they are unaware that it is OFF by default.  Perhaps it's a financial decision to make it OFF by default because OS creates higher overhead for Zoom's servers.  I get that.  But for others, the interface is not intuitive enough (took me a while to figure out what the issue was, even though I consider myself technologically adept).  

Please try to understand the user base as many are relying on this as part of their livelihood, especially musicians who teach remotely and may not be tech savvy.  Even if it is OFF by default, make it a bit more obvious that it is off.  Make design decisions that accommodate these users.  It will go a long way to foster good will.

[Khirschmann]

"Perhaps it's a financial decision to make it OFF by default because OS creates higher overhead for Zoom's servers."  This statement does not make sense since original sound is sending through unfiltered sound.  Original Sound should have less overhead on Zoom's servers since the noise filtering is not needed (unless this is being processed on the client end).  

This is just my feeling, but it doesn't seem like this was a financial decision, but rather a UX decision.  Based on what they have said here, it seems they were receiving too many complaints from users that were turning this feature on by accident.  I'm not sure I believe that either since it involves several steps.  But even if it were true, the fact that they made this decision based on a series of assumptions without opportunity to comment is problematic at best.

[dbshin]

That of course was speculation on my part. It’s possible that original sound uses higher bandwidth with higher audio fidelity, and regular audio uses higher compression? Regardless, the current setup severely lessens the user experience.