October
2007
Dictaphones must be getting better!
I have just finished transcribing a conference for a client. Since they took the plunge and went digital their conference recordings have improved enormously … so I was a bit surprised to find that the audience parts of the question and answer session were rather poor on this recording. The rest of the recording was absolutely fine.
On returning the completed transcript I mentioned this to my client and she replied that this wasn’t too surprising as their digital recording system was down and the whole thing was recorded on a Dictaphone!
So I went from being amazed at how poor the question and answer session was, to amazed at how good the rest of it was! Nevertheless, I would still not recommend recording a conference on a Dictaphone if you have any choice in the matter. Dictaphones are great for dictation … and usually that’s about as far as it goes. I think this must have been a particularly good one! See my article on getting recording equipment that’s right for you for more information on this.
So what should you do when recording a conference for transcription? Well, the fundamentals are (usually!) a good recording system, a roving microphone for the question and answer sessions, and providing your transcriptionist with key words, a speaker list and a delegate list if possible. Full details are available in my articles on this subject, What the conference organiser needs to know and outsourcing transcription for conferences .