0:00

Hello, it's Alex at Remote Work Life here.

0:03

I hope you're doing well, wherever you may be in the world, and for me it's the half term.

0:10

I work from home a lot. As you may or may not know, I've got children.

0:13

They're gonna be at home, so it gets a little bit noisier, honestly, when children around you're trying to work, and it's especially awkward when you have meetings or you have sort of engagements online where you really need at least some semblance of not necessarily silence, but at least have the ability to block out background noises.

0:40

So I wanted to share with you a piece of technology, a piece of AI technology.

0:47

Haven't you all heard of AI?

0:51

A piece of AI technology that has revolutionized my ability to work from home, or not just work from home, but work literally in any sort of environment where there is background noise, and that includes even recording podcast episodes like this, although I'm not using that particular technology now.

1:11

So the technology I'm referring to is a noise cancelling app, and it's great for people who don't work in a traditional office setting, or even if you do and you know how it is, it can be quite noisy in an office setting as well.

1:25

So this particular noise cancelling app uses AI.

1:29

It's called CRISP. You can find it at crispai and that's crisp spelt with a K and not a C, so it's crispai.

1:39

There are many other noise cancelling apps around and some products some video meeting products actually use noise cancelling technology natively.

1:57

It's natively, sort of within the software itself, but this is one of the first ones I started to use and it's worked really well for me in the past and it continues to do so now, and I do sometimes use it independently.

2:12

But, as I said, some other softwares that you get online do tend to have it embedded.

2:18

So, in fact, some of them if you think of Google Meet or if you think of Skype yes, I still do use Skype have some degree of noise cancellation, but it's not very good.

2:31

I found it's not even as good as this one that I'm sort of referring to you now.

2:36

I'm not necessarily recommending this, but it's just something that I wanted to sort of highlight to you in case you're in a situation where you need to have meetings or have interviews or whatever it is, and cancel some of the background noise and I'm not a technologist myself, but I'm really fascinated when it comes to technology.

2:57

So in future episodes I'm gonna be sharing with you some technologies, pieces of kit, pieces of apps and all that sort of thing that have enabled me to optimize my ability to work on a remote basis, whether that be at home or co-working spaces, whatever it may be.

3:16

But, as I said, crisp, I don't know necessarily how it works, but I understand that it uses AI technology to detect and cancel out background noise in real time.

3:26

It's really magic and for me, by creating a virtual microphone and speaker, it filters out annoying sounds from dogs to traffic noises, even, as I said, children.

3:41

And, best part, it does integrate into many communication platforms, and I did mention Skype earlier on.

3:49

Yes, I do use Skype every now and again, although I do use Google Meet, I use Zoom, I use Slack, so it integrates quite readily into each one of those particular platforms and it's pretty easy to install as well.

4:05

It's really easy. It's literally plug and play.

4:10

It's very little you have to do to sort of customize and it's easy to keep running and you can get up and running with it in a matter of minutes.

4:18

All you need to do is download the app on your computer.

4:22

It's even available on your smartphone, I believe, as well, although I've not used it on my smartphone and, once it's installed, you start to activate the virtual microphone or the speaker, and it's just simple as selecting the crisp option in your communication platforms audio settings.

4:45

The other thing is as well it's it won't break the bank and it's worth the investment.

4:52

Because, let's say, you've got a really important interview coming up and you're trying to cut the background noise and we all know how stressful it can be when you're waiting for the interviewers to come online.

5:05

Or let's say, you've got a meeting. For example, you're pitching something.

5:08

You're waiting for people to come online in order to to have your meeting.

5:13

It's, it's very sort of nerve-wracking anticipating that meeting starting and thinking to yourself gosh, I hope somebody doesn't make a loud noise, or I hope there's not too much background noise.

5:30

I hope they can hear me. So the last thing you want to to have on your mind is is things like that?

5:35

You want to just be focusing totally on the interview so that this in some ways alleviates those kinds of you know the fears and there's a trepidation that might be going through your mind.

5:48

If you've got, as I said, you've got an important pitch, or you've got an interview coming up or some some important meeting, so it's worth your investment.

5:56

I think they have a 14 day free trial.

5:58

I'm not in any way connected or affiliated with crisp, so I'm just sharing this with you, as I will be with other pieces to.

6:09

I'm just sharing this with you because I believe it will help.

6:12

You know, the other trigger that sort of got me to jump on to this podcast was to, or is because, as I said, it's half term, approaching half term here, and my kids will be here for the next week or so, so I'm going to need some sort of protection in inverted commas from those background noises.

6:35

As I said, it works with all the devices as well, so you shouldn't you shouldn't be too fussed.

6:40

There it's. They've got good privacy, good security as well.

6:43

This is always a feature and also a concern these days, especially when we're working across different networks, especially if you're going out of your, your house, even if you are in the house you could.

6:55

Privacy is something that is of concern and, from what I can see, crisp does take that seriously.

7:01

What they say is they ensure all the data transmitted between your device and their service servers is encrypted.

7:08

So I'd hope that gives you at least some peace of mind and they don't store any audio recordings I don't believe on their servers.

7:16

That means your confident, your conversations will remain confidential and that's really what you want, especially, as I said, if it's an important meeting, if it's an important interview coming up.

7:30

So to sum it all up, I think I mean I've been using crisp for a while.

7:33

There's there's lots of others out in the market now, but at the time for me, crisp was a total game changer for me as a remote worker, especially as a work from home parent, and I think it will help you.

7:46

If what I'd say as well is I do a bit of background research as well because, as I said, crisp is the only one I mentioned here.

7:52

There are many others. You should do your own due diligence and compare the market, see what else is out there that will help you to cancel background noise, and see what else is out there that could, I guess, suits you in terms of finances, if it's your pocket, etc.

8:13

It's cost effective for you and it works for you.

8:17

I mean, nowadays I would hope folks are more sympathetic to background noises, but this is just something which adds a little bit of extra in, as I said, invert commas, protection against those noises and it just makes your interviews, meetings just go that bit more smoothly.

8:36

So check it out. Check them out at crispai that's crisp with ak, and I'll be back again for another piece of technology that will help you with your remote work life or if you're working from home.