What’s New

Interactive Video Commenting

Now you can insert your comments into a video exactly where you want them. Comments will appear in the video’s timeline as a small blue nib, allowing you to see where others have inserted them as well. The best part is that you don’t have to learn anything new. It just works.

Pause While Recording

While you’re recording audio or video in VoiceThread, you might need a quick break. Now you can pick up right where you left off! After you click on “Stop Recording,” just take your break and then click on “Record More” to keep going.

Monthly Reporting

At the start of every month, administrators for School and University Licenses now receive an email detailing how VoiceThread has been used over the past month. This is a great way to see at a glance where your members are using VoiceThread most successfully and keep all of your information up to date.

Accessibility

We strive to be accessible to all types of learners and participants. By design VoiceThread already offers multiple means of engagement, representation, action, and expression, but there is always more we can do. With an updated VPAT and WCAG 2.0 AA compliance, we can better ensure that everyone can succeed with VoiceThread.

Security

Security and infrastructure improvements are always ongoing at VoiceThread. This year, in addition to regular patches, updates, and maintenance, we have focused on faster load times and processing, converting every single VoiceThread page to use HTTPS only, and completing our full transition from Flash to HTML5.

What’s Next?

Automatic Captions

Automatic speech-to-text captioning will soon be available to all Enterprise License holders with the Platinum Service Tier. There is no administrative workload, no jobs to approve and manage, and no long wait times for users. Every single audio or video recording your users create will be captioned and available within minutes.  The Automatic Caption Service is a set-and-forget feature.

Contact us if you are interested in upgrading to the Platinum Service Tier.

Mobile App

Version 4 of the VoiceThread mobile app is on its way! With a fresh look, more sharing options, increased stability and reliability, and more accessibility options, it will make VoiceThreading on the go much easier and more flexible.

New Assignments

We’ve been telling you about courses and assignments for a while now, and we’re proud to say that we are moving right along!  Soon we will have the “New Assignments” available for LTI-integrated institutions to try out.

• ​Greater variety of assignment types and more collaborative options between students
• More assessment flexibility
• Enhancement of existing assignment types based on your feedback
• Streamlined workflows for both instructors and students
• Tighter mobile integration

LTI 1.3

If you already use VoiceThread in your learning management system, then the Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) standard is what makes that possible. Version 1.3 of the LTI standard is in development now, and VoiceThread is an early adopter. This will offer deeper LMS integration, more rostering transparency, and even some brand new features. We should be ready for some beta testers by the end of 2018!

Threaded Commenting Update

We’re updating the button for creating a threaded comment. Instead of the branching icon, it will look like a regular reply icon. Nothing about how this feature works will change, and the simpler button should make replying to a comment in VoiceThread much clearer.