The Equipment in action

Agroecology Workshop

Spiders used at a cattle breeders meeting in Spain, October 2015

Field test of the ALIS Spider (Zimbabwe, Mali, India...) :

Listening to interpretation...

Spiders have been used at the People's Health Assembly in Cape-Town, South Africa as well as at the Agroecology Seminar of the Via Campesina (Congo-Kinshasa) in July 2012., the Reclaim the Fields Europan Camp, at Nyeleni Europe Assemblies, at No-Borders camps, during field seminars of the United Farm Workers etc. etc.

This is the standard way of using Spiders - one group, sitting around the Spider, connected via headphones (two people can share one headphone) and the interpreter sits on the side or in the back...

BUT THERE ALSO IS THIS...

This is NOT the standard way of using Spiders !

UPDATE : Since more and more people are doing it, the picture above is the ONLY practical way (in our opinion) to use the Spiders in a linked mode for a large audience

CAUTION : this solution involves lots of people tripping over wires etc. etc. and needs a technician on hand to fix bad connections etc. We do NOT recommend using Spiders for groups over 30 people... get a radio emitter instead !

ONE THING WE HAVE LEARNED: the good quality of the MICROPHONE is a key to the success of the use of the Spider. Get a GOOD QUALITY mike (forget the cheap headphone PC-type microphone we used at first) if you want people to be able to hear the interpretation. The same thing goes for the audio extension cords to link Spiders with each others.

Crap quality cables = crap quality sound.

Examples of set-up (click on image to enlarge) :

In November 2010, we took 10 SPIDERS to the Pastoral Women's Gathering organized in the village of Mera (Gujarat, India). They were the only interpretation device available there. Since there was no power, we worked exclusively with batteries and provided interpretation to groups of 45-50 people by INTERCONNECTING Spiders together with audio extension cables.

We tested 10 SPIDERS in March 2010 in Mali, during the Training Seminar of LA VIA CAMPESINA (Nyeleni, Selingue). They worked fine and allowed us to circumvent the frequent power outages during thunderstorms.

We still have to work out a strategy for taking RELAY though, remember this is a WHISPERING ASSISTANCE DEVICE not a replacement for a BOOTH...

In Shashe Training Centre - Masvingo Province - Zimbabwe

The ALIS Console in pictures: