invite.cam — host & guest guide

What is invite.cam?

invite.cam is a front-end for VDO.Ninja that adds tools for running events, shows, and interviews where not everyone needs to be on camera at once. Hosts get a permanent room under their Discord name, a lobby where viewers can watch and chat, and a control panel for pulling guests live.

Two-tier model: participants vs. audience

Everyone who opens your room lands in one of two places:

• Lobby (audience tier) — watches a CDN preview (YouTube / Twitch / MeshCast / etc.) and chats. Not on camera. Low bandwidth. Unlimited size.
• Room (participant tier) — P2P mesh in VDO.Ninja. Camera and mic active. Best for ~5–10 people before mesh quality drops.

You (the host) decide who crosses from one to the other. A guest in the lobby can click Raise hand or let you know in chat; you pull them in when ready, and send them back to the lobby when done.

Host quickstart

1. Go to app.invite.cam/signin and click sign in with Discord.
2. You land in your own room (named after your Discord handle, e.g. app.invite.cam/yourname). The VDO.Ninja director iframe loads for you automatically — this is your live camera/mic panel.
3. At the top, the Room link row shows the URL to share with guests. Click Copy.
4. Optionally click Lobby Settings and paste a preview URL (see below) so guests in the lobby have something to watch while waiting.
5. As guests arrive, they show up in the user list on the right. Click one, pick a destination, and click Save.

Sharing your room

Two ways to invite people:

The room link (casual — anyone can join the lobby)

Copy the link from the Room link row at the top of your room. Post it anywhere. Anyone who opens it lands in the lobby, where they can watch the preview and chat. They won't go on camera unless you activate them.

A named invite link (for specific people or single-use)

Click + Create invite link. Give it a label (e.g. "Panelist — Alice"). Pick where they should go when they click the link:

• The lobby — they land in the lobby like anyone else.
• Straight into this room — they skip the lobby and enter VDO.Ninja directly (camera/mic prompt). Use this for trusted panelists.
• A custom URL — anything else.

Click Save. The invite link appears in the dialog. Uncheck "Anyone with this link can use it" if you want a single-use link (first person to use it claims it).

Pulling a guest on-camera

A guest is in the lobby. You want them on camera.

1. In the user list (right side), click their name. A settings panel opens.
2. Change Send this user to from "The lobby" to "This room (live camera/mic)".
3. Leave Apply on save checked.
4. Click Save.

On their end, the lobby iframe swaps to VDO.Ninja. They get the standard room-join screen — they pick camera, mic, or an avatar/photo placeholder and click to join. They appear in your director panel.

If the guest should use a specific filler image, paste an HTTPS image URL into Avatar/photo URL before saving. The guest still joins through VDO.Ninja, but that image is preloaded as their avatar source.

To send them back to the lobby: open their settings again, pick "The lobby", Save. Their mic/camera stream is released on the VDO.Ninja side, and they're back to watching.

Lobby Settings: preview, helpers, audio

Click Lobby Settings at the top of your room to configure what lobby viewers see.

Lobby embed URL

Any embeddable HTTPS URL. The lobby iframe loads this for every non-activated visitor. See supported formats. Leave blank and the lobby is chat-only.

After you click Save, the button changes to Saved. If you reopen Lobby Settings, the same URL and welcome message should still be filled in.

Welcome message

A short text that appears in the chat as a system notice when a guest joins. Good for things like "Starting at 7pm ET — drop your questions in chat."

Guest chat

By default, lobby guests can type in the shared chat. Turn Allow guests to send lobby chat off for read-only audience lobbies. Host messages still appear and are styled larger.

Guest isolation

Keep activated guests from seeing each other is recommended for larger rooms. Activated guests can still publish to the director, but their VDO.Ninja view only subscribes to directors instead of every other guest.

App helpers / co-directors

Add Discord usernames to App helpers / co-directors, one per line. Helpers must sign in with Discord. They get the app.invite sidebar, can move guests between the lobby and room, and can add guests to scenes through the director iframe. Only the room owner can change Lobby Settings.

Guest audio defaults

Guests join muted by default adds VDO.Ninja's muted-on-join flag to activated guest links. Only host/helpers can unmute guests uses VDO.Ninja's director-unmute-only link option. Guest mic processing can request VDO's compressor or limiter; the default leaves VDO/browser processing alone.

What the guest sees

Guests opening your room link go through app.invite.cam/guest, enter a display name, and land in the lobby. They see:

• The preview video you configured (if any)
• A chat box, if guest chat is enabled — everything they type is visible to you and other lobby viewers
• A Raise hand button they can use to request being brought into the live room
• No camera or mic prompt — that only appears after you pull them in

When a guest raises their hand, the host sees a [HAND] marker next to that guest in the user list. The marker clears when they lower their hand, leave, or get activated.

Embeddable URL formats

The lobby embed URL accepts a wide range of formats. Paste whatever is easiest — the app normalizes to an embeddable version automatically.

Chat

Everyone in the lobby shares one chat unless the host turns guest chat off. Participants in the room also see the lobby chat. Host and helper messages are highlighted and larger.

• Messages support URLs — they become clickable links automatically.
• HTML in messages is escaped, so nothing pasted in chat can execute.
• Hosts can mute a specific guest's lobby chat from the user's settings panel.
• Keyboard: ↑/↓ scrolls by 50px, PgUp/PgDn by a page.
• Anonymous guests route through a server-side relay to prevent spoofing.

Troubleshooting

Guest says "no camera/mic prompt"

Expected — they're in the lobby. Activate them (see above). If they're already activated and still don't see a prompt, have them check browser permissions (the iframe is allowed camera + mic; the block is likely at the browser or OS level).

"Bye. You signed in somewhere else."

You opened invite.cam in a second tab or device. Only one session per user is allowed to prevent split-brain state. Reopen in the tab you want to keep.

Chat works but lobby video is blank

No Lobby embed URL is set. Open Lobby Settings and paste one (see URL formats).

Invite link sent but guest says "it doesn't work"

Check: is the invite single-use? If "Anyone with this link can use it" was unchecked, the first person to open it claims it — subsequent visitors will bounce. Create a new one, or re-open its settings and check that box.

Admin controls are missing

Admin mode only activates when the room name matches your Discord username. If you signed in but landed on someone else's room URL (via ?room=), you'll be a guest there, not the host.

VDO.Ninja co-director controls are missing

Use the app.invite helper list in Lobby Settings, then have helpers sign in with Discord and open the app.invite room link. VDO.Ninja's own generated co-director invite may not include the app.invite room wiring, which can make it land in the wrong/default room.

I want to kick someone permanently

Use Block this guest from joining in the user's settings panel. This works best for Discord-authenticated users. Anonymous guests can change names, so use named Discord invites if you need stronger identity.