New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…….
Original story (published on February 24, 2021) follows:
Google took advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic and freed up its previously premium Google Meet video conferencing service to everyone who owns a Google account.
This change came about nearly a year ago, with the search giant clearly aiming to grab a share of a market largely dominated by Zoom.
Unlike Duo and Hangouts that offered casual video calling services, Google Meet lets meeting organizers add up to 100 participants at once.
Besides video calls of up to 1 hour, Meet also bundles cool features such as screen sharing, scheduling, ending meetings for everyone and even muting all participants at once, among others.
Towards the end of last year, Google also made it possible for meeting participants to hold a Q&A session. According to Google, the Meet Q&A function is here:
But for some reason, the feature, which is hidden under the Activities option in the top right, started disappearing for some Google Meet users a few weeks ago.
If you are still experiencing this issue, it should be good news to learn that Google already addressed it. The fix started rolling out last month and it should have reached everyone by now.
Unfortunately, software-related issues never end. As Google was busy fixing the missing Q&A issue in Meet, it looks like one other related issue slipped through.
For months now, some Google Meet users have been reporting that the Activities option is completely missing for them.
In order to get to the Q&A section, one must go through the Activities section. If the latter is missing, it means the likes of Q&A and Poll features are also inaccessible for this lot.
Sometimes the Activities icon re-appears and then disappears, which is a bit strange. While Google has limitations as to who can use this function, affected users argue that they meet these conditions.
Some of those affected say it emerged they had been assigned to the wrong groups and had the wrong license as well. Once these were addressed by the IT Admin, the Activities button re-appeared.
Other affected users say a simple reset of the Google Meet link re-enabled the Activities option for them. This can be done by heading to “classroom.google.com” and hit the class Settings > General > Meet.
We still wait for an official word from Google regarding this matter. Until then, be sure to try any of the workarounds suggested above.
Apparently, some Google Meet users say they are missing the breakout rooms feature, which is found in the same space as the Q&A option under Activities menu.
Update (March 02)
We will be looking out for a statement from Google regarding both the missing breakout rooms feature and Activities menu.
Although not confirmed, Google Meet users experiencing issues with breakout rooms missing can try installing the Meet Plus for Google Meet extension and see if the issue gets addressed.
Update 2 (March 16)
If interested, the link to grab the extension, which offers plenty of other cool features too, is here.
Those who are still not able to use the breakout rooms feature in Google Meet can try some of the popular Google Chrome extensions given here to get the said feature back.
Update 3 (March 25)
PiunikaWeb started as purely an investigative tech journalism website with main focus on ‘breaking’ or ‘exclusive’ news. In no time, our stories got picked up by the likes of Forbes, Foxnews, Gizmodo, TechCrunch, Engadget, The Verge, Macrumors, and many others. Want to know more about us? Head here.
