When you first enter Gather in Chrome (or if you've cleared your Chrome history), you will see a pop-up asking for camera and microphone access permissions. Click Allow in order to provide the best experience in Gather.
Click Allow in the Chrome site permission settings to enable audio and video.
If you block Gather from accessing your camera or microphone in Chrome, you will see a camera icon in the upper right of your site address bar with a red "x" to indicate that you have denied the site access. You can click on this to change your preferences.
Click the blocked camera or mic icon at the right of the URL bar in Chrome to view and change camera and mic settings.
Select the option to allow Gather access to your camera and microphone. Refresh the page for the changes to go into effect.
Refresh the page to apply the updated settings.
You can view or change your permissions at any time by clicking the lock icon to the left of the URL.
Access the Privacy and Security settings by clicking the lock icon next to the URL.
When you first enter Gather in Firefox (or if you've cleared your Firefox history), you will see a pop-up asking for camera and microphone access permissions. Click Allow to provide the best experience in Gather.
Click Allow in the Firefox site permission settings to enable audio and video.
If you block Gather from accessing your camera or microphone in Firefox, you will see camera and mic icons with slashes through them to indicate that you have denied the site access. You can click on these to change your preferences.
If you have denied Gather access to either your camera or microphone, you'll see video and mic icons with a grey slash through the them in the URL bar.
You can view or change your permissions by clicking the lock icon to the left of the site URL. In the site permissions pop-up, click the "x" next to each blocked permission. Refresh your page.
Click the "X" next to each blocked permission in the Firefox site privacy settings to allow the camera and/or mic. Refresh the page to apply the updated settings.
Once all permissions have been granted, you can check or change your settings by clicking the lock icon to the left of the site URL. Your site security settings should look something like this:
Firefox site settings with both camera and microphone permissions temporarily allowed.
If you get this message instead, refresh the page.
Site settings after cancelling blocked permissions but not yet refreshing.
Safari (on desktop, not mobile) will prompt you for camera and microphone permissions when you first log into a space.
Grant permissions for camera and mic access for Safari.
Safari will prompt you for camera and microphone permissions separately when you first log into a space. Click Allow to permit Gather to use your microphone and to use your camera.
In the Safari menu, click Preferences, and select the Websites tab. Scroll down to Camera and Microphone. Click into each one of these and find gather.town on the list of websites to the right, then set the drop down menu to Allow (or Ask, if you wish to be prompted every time).
If you select Never Allow for This Website for camera and mic access, you must change your permissions in Safari Preferences.
You might get stuck with a screen saying "Awaiting Audio and Video Permissions" if you dismiss or block the initial mic/camera permission pop-up window or if you have not previously enabled security permissions for your browser on a Macbook or Apple computer inside of your Apple Privacy and Security Settings.
To access these settings, open System Preferences and select Security and Privacy.
Open your Apple System Preferences by click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your screen.
From your system preferences, select and open your Security and Privacy settings.
Enable permissions for both your camera and microphone for the browser you are using.
In the menu on the left side, find and select 'Camera' and 'Microphone' and check the box on the right to enable permissions for your web browser to use your camera and microphone.
You might need to click the padlock in the bottom left corner to allow changes to your system preferences.
The biggest culprit of audio or visual issues—after you've checked your browser and system settings—is another app using your camera and preventing other apps from accessing it. This happens especially if you are using other video calling tools like Zoom or video effects programs like OBS or Snap Camera. To troubleshoot, close any other applications that use your camera or microphone. Additionally, check your other browser tabs to make sure there aren't other instances of Gather or another website using your camera or microphone.
If you can see yourself but can't see or hear anyone else, check and disable if any extensions are blocking autoplay permissions or blocking WebRTC. (These may have been installed this to prevent your IP from getting leaked.)
Because of the nature of the server infrastructure of virtual private network (VPN), Gather is unable to properly function on some kinds of VPNs, campus networks, or corporate networks. If you're in such a situation, you can try:
To unblock gather.town on a personal or corporate firewall, please add these domains and ports as exceptions (or ask your administrator to do so):
Domains: *.gather.town
Ports: 80 and 443
Because of the nature of the server infrastructure of virtual private network (VPN), Gather is unable to properly function on some kinds of VPNs, campus networks, or corporate networks. If you're in such a situation, you can try:
To unblock gather.town on a personal or corporate firewall, please add these domains and ports as exceptions (or ask your administrator to do so):
Domains: *.gather.town
Ports: 80 and 443
If you hear a voice announcing "TRIAL MODE" or similar in your Gather space, check for any participants using audio or video programs or plugins such as OBS or 'e2esoft ivcam'.
If you hear the murmuring of voices in addition to other soft sounds, it is possible that the owner of the space you are in (or the default template of the space) has embedded ambient sounds or background sounds. These are all pre-recorded and one-way transmissions.
The only time others can hear or see you is when you can see their video box appear in your video carousel. If they have turned their camera off, you will still see a black box with their name listed and you will still be transmitting video and audio to them unless you turn off your own camera and microphone.
Gather cannot make sounds in your browser aside from the chat notification, ambient sounds or embedded videos, and will not announce whether your space is free or paid.
At this time, sharing your computer audio is only available on Chrome. To share your audio, remember to check the box to share your audio!
You can share your audio for your entire screen or from individual Chrome Tabs
At this time, on MacOS, you are only able to share audio from individual Chrome tabs.
To help build a better understanding of particular A/V issues, we've added warning messages for when someone is trying to connect to more participants than can currently be supported by Gather (currently 100 participants if you're screensharing in addition to sharing your own video and audio). This is most likely to happen when spotlighted and attempting to broadcast to a large number of participants in the room.
You will see a red error message if there are A/V sharing issues: "Sharing A/V with too many people. Try turning off your video or screen."
When you are sharing your A/V with too many people, you will see this warning message.
The participants who are unable to connect will see the speaker's video preview with a message stating, "Sharing A/V with too many people."
Those who are trying to connect to the speaker may see a message on the speaker's preview that indicates A/V issues.
Note: As you reduce what you are sharing (e.g., screensharing, streaming your video, streaming your audio), more participants can connect with you.