How Google Meet's noise cancellation works
Most people have no idea of the amount of incredibly advanced signal processing that goes into echo cancellation and noise cancellation in videoconferencing.<p>This post is on noise cancellation specifically, and it actually has the potential to be a <i>huge</i> step forward.<p>One of the big audio problems with group meetings is that the background noise from each participant adds up, to a point where it quickly becomes unbearable. For that reason, videoconferencing generally only plays audio from one or two participants at most, using a fairly simple estimation of whichever audio signal is currently loudest. The problem is that this can make it really hard to interrupt (people will literally not hear you), or tell the difference between two people going "mm-hmm" versus the whole group. If you've ever been in a group meeting where everybody applauds something, this is why you <i>see</i> everyone applauding but only hear a smattering.<p>But if this noise cancellation really succeeds, it could be a huge leap forward because audio cues and overlap will actually work for the first time -- hearing the "mm-hmms", hearing everyone pipe up, and so on. Videoconferencing will feel more like an actual single shared audio environment, rather than the kind of "walkie-talkie" effect it so often feels like now.<p>I'm really looking forward to this.