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We've had the prospect of video chat for decades. 2001 A Space Odyssey showed us that it would be the de facto way to talk to our families. Tom Selleck promised

We've had the prospect of video chat for decades. 2001 A Space Odyssey showed us that it would be the de facto way to talk to our families. Tom Selleck promised us in the early 1990s (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZb0avfQme8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZb0avfQme8) that AT&T would bring it to us. And when we finally got it, most people said, "meh". Almost all chat platforms have some sort of video integration, and for the most part, its acceptance is lukewarm. Perhaps it's because it doesn't work amazingly well? Perhaps its because people really don't want to have to get dressed to have a conversation? Perhaps I'm just not in the right crowd?

xphilter 9y ago
FaceTime seems to be way more popular than most realize. Anecdotally, my children use it daily to talk with grandparents and cousins and I see people on public transportation using it in place of telephone calls (makes more sense there because they're not driving). And, I use it when traveling to talk to my family. The issue going forward is the lack of standardization across protocols. Despite Apple's mention in the keynote when FaceTime was announced that it would be open, FaceTime is iOS/Mac only for now. And, I don't see Facebook's playing nice with Amazon's, etc.
- macNchz 9y ago
  > makes more sense there because they're not driving I've driven next to people on the highway who were on a Facetime call with their phone resting on the dash in front of the speedometer, so that is a thing that people do, unfortunately.
- digi_owl 9y ago
  Wonder how much that has to do with vertical integration. If you already have a apple device you are already registered and anyone else on your contacts list that also have a apple device is also ready to receive your call.
  - azinman2 9y ago
    It also works super well.
- vermontdevil 9y ago
  It's iOS/Mac only because it has to go through Apple server. This is because of this lawsuit: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20236114 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20236114
  - opportune 9y ago
    Interestingly, it seems the company they lost to is effectively a publicly traded patent troll
    - smnrchrds 9y ago
      And it has a market cap of just over 200 million dollars [1]. Makes me wonder why Apple wouldn't simply buy the company. They can more than easily afford it. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/VHC https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/VHC
      - eutropia 9y ago
        If I were feeling vindictive I wouldn't want to reward a patent troll by making them multimillionaires. I'd rather sue them out of existence...
- saagarjha 9y ago
  > Apple's mention in the keynote when FaceTime was announced that it would be open They were planning to do so, but got caught up in a lawsuit with VirnetX.
  - am1988 9y ago
    I'm so glad we have patents to help further innovation.
DarkTree 9y ago
There's also Bell Lab's "picturephone" from the 19060s(!), that despite market research showing would be a hit, ended up being quite a market failure. http://ethw.org/Picturephone http://ethw.org/Picturephone
vbezhenar 9y ago
I'm avoiding even voice calls, I just don't like it, e-mail is best communication platform for me, followed by chats. I would only accept video calls from my relatives. It's a very niche thing.
- Thlom 9y ago
  But management likes it, so there's still a lot of money in video conferencing.
digi_owl 9y ago
One thing was pricing (back when UMTS was all about selling video calls, the operators slapped on an higher charge), another was that until recently the handheld screens (never mind cameras) were very low resolution. These days however it is all data.
- kalleboo 9y ago
  When Three launched in Sweden, they made video calls free for an introductory period. Adoption was still abysmal.
flanbiscuit 9y ago
A lot of people I know, so this is very anecdotal, don't even like to talk on the phone anymore, they prefer texting. I do most of my video chatting at work with some of our remote co-workers and that's mainly because we want to screen share. If it wasn't for the screen share (we use google hangouts) then we'd probably never video chat. My theory about why people would rather just text than voice/video chat is that it consumes to much effort and commitment of time. People want to be able to quickly switch contexts and apps. If you're talking or video chatting then you have to be more focused and your phone is occupied during that process. Also I think there's just an abundance of ways to communicate with anyone around the world now that video chat is not as special as it once seemed. I tried counting how many ways I could be contacts and my list was long.
- toomanybeersies 9y ago
  As another anecdote, a lot of people I know prefer to call than text. It's a good way to get an immediate response and plan things quickly, rather than trying to play scheduling tennis over text.
pazimzadeh 9y ago
Obligatory link to David Foster Wallace's prediction of this http://kottke.org/10/06/david-foster-wallace-on-iphone-4s-facetime http://kottke.org/10/06/david-foster-wallace-on-iphone-4s-fa...
Theodores 9y ago
Video was also the feature that was going to justify the 3G spectrum auction prices. In the UK many billions were paid by the telcos and part of the marketing promise at the time was the then 'obvious' application of video calling. We would all be chatting by video on our flip phones, not sending txt messages. txt messages were an accidental phenomenon as I understand it, something squeezed into the chatter needed for the phone to stay in touch with base station. Cameras in phones by Nokia et al. from 2005 are with this in mind, front facing, VGA video that is handled at the phone level as a video call: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N70 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N70 There is no 'app' that puts the video in a http stream somehow, this was baked in functionality, now abandoned by telcos. Yet there is the selfie phenomenon, again something that few imagined to be the thing it is. Cameras used to point outwards, now they point at the owner. I would not be surprised if cheap phones only come with selfie cameras soon, much like how laptops only come with 'selfie cameras'. A large tablet for just doing Facebook and Facebook video does not sound portable enough for what it does, 'phablets' are better on the commute, why carry another device? Sounds to me as if Facebook are trying to hard on all the failed VR apps.
toomanybeersies 9y ago
Most people I know that don't live near their parents use video chat to talk to them. My parents are luddites, so I still ring their landline.

xphilter 9y ago

FaceTime seems to be way more popular than most realize. Anecdotally, my children use it daily to talk with grandparents and cousins and I see people on public transportation using it in place of telephone calls (makes more sense there because they're not driving). And, I use it when traveling to talk to my family. The issue going forward is the lack of standardization across protocols. Despite Apple's mention in the keynote when FaceTime was announced that it would be open, FaceTime is iOS/Mac only for now. And, I don't see Facebook's playing nice with Amazon's, etc.

macNchz 9y ago
> makes more sense there because they're not driving I've driven next to people on the highway who were on a Facetime call with their phone resting on the dash in front of the speedometer, so that is a thing that people do, unfortunately.
digi_owl 9y ago
Wonder how much that has to do with vertical integration. If you already have a apple device you are already registered and anyone else on your contacts list that also have a apple device is also ready to receive your call.
- azinman2 9y ago
  It also works super well.
vermontdevil 9y ago
It's iOS/Mac only because it has to go through Apple server. This is because of this lawsuit: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20236114 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20236114
- opportune 9y ago
  Interestingly, it seems the company they lost to is effectively a publicly traded patent troll
  - smnrchrds 9y ago
    And it has a market cap of just over 200 million dollars [1]. Makes me wonder why Apple wouldn't simply buy the company. They can more than easily afford it. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/VHC https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/VHC
    - eutropia 9y ago
      If I were feeling vindictive I wouldn't want to reward a patent troll by making them multimillionaires. I'd rather sue them out of existence...
saagarjha 9y ago
> Apple's mention in the keynote when FaceTime was announced that it would be open They were planning to do so, but got caught up in a lawsuit with VirnetX.
- am1988 9y ago
  I'm so glad we have patents to help further innovation.

DarkTree 9y ago

There's also Bell Lab's "picturephone" from the 19060s(!), that despite market research showing would be a hit, ended up being quite a market failure. http://ethw.org/Picturephone http://ethw.org/Picturephone

vbezhenar 9y ago

I'm avoiding even voice calls, I just don't like it, e-mail is best communication platform for me, followed by chats. I would only accept video calls from my relatives. It's a very niche thing.

Thlom 9y ago
But management likes it, so there's still a lot of money in video conferencing.

digi_owl 9y ago

One thing was pricing (back when UMTS was all about selling video calls, the operators slapped on an higher charge), another was that until recently the handheld screens (never mind cameras) were very low resolution. These days however it is all data.

kalleboo 9y ago
When Three launched in Sweden, they made video calls free for an introductory period. Adoption was still abysmal.

flanbiscuit 9y ago

A lot of people I know, so this is very anecdotal, don't even like to talk on the phone anymore, they prefer texting. I do most of my video chatting at work with some of our remote co-workers and that's mainly because we want to screen share. If it wasn't for the screen share (we use google hangouts) then we'd probably never video chat. My theory about why people would rather just text than voice/video chat is that it consumes to much effort and commitment of time. People want to be able to quickly switch contexts and apps. If you're talking or video chatting then you have to be more focused and your phone is occupied during that process. Also I think there's just an abundance of ways to communicate with anyone around the world now that video chat is not as special as it once seemed. I tried counting how many ways I could be contacts and my list was long.

toomanybeersies 9y ago
As another anecdote, a lot of people I know prefer to call than text. It's a good way to get an immediate response and plan things quickly, rather than trying to play scheduling tennis over text.

pazimzadeh 9y ago

Obligatory link to David Foster Wallace's prediction of this http://kottke.org/10/06/david-foster-wallace-on-iphone-4s-facetime http://kottke.org/10/06/david-foster-wallace-on-iphone-4s-fa...

Theodores 9y ago

Video was also the feature that was going to justify the 3G spectrum auction prices. In the UK many billions were paid by the telcos and part of the marketing promise at the time was the then 'obvious' application of video calling. We would all be chatting by video on our flip phones, not sending txt messages. txt messages were an accidental phenomenon as I understand it, something squeezed into the chatter needed for the phone to stay in touch with base station. Cameras in phones by Nokia et al. from 2005 are with this in mind, front facing, VGA video that is handled at the phone level as a video call: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N70 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_N70 There is no 'app' that puts the video in a http stream somehow, this was baked in functionality, now abandoned by telcos. Yet there is the selfie phenomenon, again something that few imagined to be the thing it is. Cameras used to point outwards, now they point at the owner. I would not be surprised if cheap phones only come with selfie cameras soon, much like how laptops only come with 'selfie cameras'. A large tablet for just doing Facebook and Facebook video does not sound portable enough for what it does, 'phablets' are better on the commute, why carry another device? Sounds to me as if Facebook are trying to hard on all the failed VR apps.

toomanybeersies 9y ago

Most people I know that don't live near their parents use video chat to talk to them. My parents are luddites, so I still ring their landline.