But only for the webcast/recording, and only until the better mic can make its way to the speaker. I think they would be OK for the purpose of getting the meeting recorded. So would the cell phones, and they are of course low quality.

Cell phones would need fancy echo cancel if put on the loudspeakers, but I don’t think we need that.

Sure, lining up at the mic works also, but for whatever reason that is not how some conferences want to do it. Also does not allow the moderator to pick people to call on based on knowledge of who they are. With cell phones with caller-id (which is coming) the moderator could get a queue like a phone-in show.