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Videophones Revisited
amitupadhyay7 writes "The NYTimes is running a story on Video Phones. ...more than 30 percent of American homes now have much faster 'pipes' coming into their homes: broadband Internet. Apple exploited this situation, for example, with its $140 iSight camera, a pocketcam that clips onto a Macintosh screen for free, high-quality Internet video calls. Now a company called Viseon has taken the next step by creating an actual video telephone called the VisiFone... in a related news Cisco is adding video to their IP phones. Telcos' response so far seems constructive."
Actually, this was predicted by Moore in the 1960's...it took them a long time to get it working.
I travel a lot and make sure to chat with my wife for a little while via iSight/iChat.
I find it that it helps reduce a lot of the anxiety of travel, for her/homesickness for me. Kind of strange, but 5 mins on camera can be more soothing that 1 hour on the phone.
And the quality of iSight is awesome. Unless there is rapid movement, the quality is comparable to TV.
My 2 cents.
Why is it that cisco is cramming this new feature onto IP phones - one that people don't really want?
clarifier: I install cisco IPT for a living so this is just my 2 cents from the field...
Customers complain about:
1) the platform running on Win2k (bugs/virus/stability)
2)lack of traditional PBX features (yeah, they're getting there, but not quite to what a G3 has)
3) lack of support for adavanced security on the wireless phones
4) lack of a true operator console
The list goes on. Not once has anyone said "These phones are crap - there's no video phone!" nope - that's not what keeps people from buying them.
So why address the one thing that people AREN'T clamoring for?
Dunno. I like IPT, I like cisco, I think the Cisco IPT platform is the best by far. But if Cisco wants to take market share away from traditional phones then they should focus on adding critical features that users want/expect.
I created this account just so I could comment on this story
Yep - the 'videophone' is an 'invention' that comes up and dies away with astounding regularity. I have a 1927 silent film about the future where a character makes a pay phone call on one. Tele-video actually had a lot of research in the 20's thru 40's and came to fruition with the common TV system in the early 50's (all the experience and research in WWII radar helped tremendously). The videophone was the future of Telephony in the 1964 worlds fair exhibit by ATT, and about every half generation since someone has had the same brilliant idea followed by the same lack of consumer excitement and demand.
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