Comparison
How does KZWeb compare to other systems?
| Kingdom Hall Phone system | KZWeb | |
|---|---|---|
| Operational Costs Kingdom Hall |
- Fixed - High, subscription for each phoneline/listener - Not bound to specific phone district |
- Fixed - Low, independent of number of listeners - Not bound to specific district or even geographic region |
| Connection Costs listeners |
- Nothing if using a Free-to-Landlines service (subscription fee only) - Variable: per minute fee |
- Nothing if already connected to the Internet (subscription fee only) |
| Listening Device | - telephone (preferably handsfree) | - PC (Windows, Mac, Linux) |
| Usability | - Not bound to specific phone district, but possibly higher costs for the listener except with Free-to-Landlines service | - Not bound to specific geographical location, even internationally, at low local internet access rates if any |
| Scalability | - 8 listeners maximum per installed system | - Limited by bandwidth only. On a regular ADSL line with 1024 kbps upload speed: 20 to 25 listenens. |
| Flexibility | - Maximum of 8 listeners: first come, first served - Phonenumbers are fixed/known, so anyone can connect anonymously forever once the number is known |
- Authorisation for new listeners can be added immediately, even temporarily - Listeners are not anonymous but known at all times - Authorisation of alistener can be revoked immediately |
| Sound Quality | - Low, limited to 3kHz by the telephone system | - High. MP3 encoding in 32kbps (for support of dial-up connections) is already better than telephone quality. Bitrate can be increased when only using broadband connections for listeners. |
| Possibility to participate in meeting | - built into phone system | - via regular or cell phone |
| Play Audio | - via an external player device in the Kingdom Hall sound system | - built into the system. Very easy to use. |
| Recordings | - via an external recording device in the Kingdom Hall sound system | - digital recordings in MP3 format with a configurable archive (default 1 year) |
| Connect Kingdom Halls | - not possible | - built into the system. Very easy to use. |