Lately I Just Use Skype/Pamela
One of the most common questions people ask about getting started in podcasting is ‘How do you record a telephone call?’
Back in my early years as an internet radio show host, I tried every cheap-o solution that I could find. Remember that in the summer of 2003 we didn’t have hundreds of podcaster enthusiasts sharing their ‘how to’s’ for free on blogs and forums. Finding information was hard and I felt like most of the time I didn’t even know the right questions to ask.
To start with I bought a little Radio Shack part for $15 and it certainly captured the phone conversation, but it also captured the loudest phone line humm I’d ever heard.
I went back to the store and bought another part of $25, thinking maybe spending ten dollars more would solve my issue. Nope, no difference.
So I went to the internet and searched for phone recording tools. Mostly I found more little doohickies like the Radio Shack parts I already tried. I bought one for $60 and another for $200 but my results didn’t vary much and I sent them back.
Finally I stumbled on the JK Audio website and found the Inline Patch.
With the Inline Patch I was able to capture voices and minimize humm as well as compensate for differences in volume between my show guest and myself.
I’ve used the patch faithfully until just this year when SkypeOut won my heart away from my land line.
I signed up for my own SkypeIn phone number for my business and started using Skype almost exclusively. I remembered receiving a free license for Pamela a couple of years back so I downloaded that and dug the license number out of an old email.
Pamela allows you to record your Skype calls beautifully and for now my Inline Patch is gathering dust on my desk.
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