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I wonder how much of this is generational-- my teenage daughter probably videochats more in a week than I have in my life. I think that over the longue duree,

I wonder how much of this is generational-- my teenage daughter probably videochats more in a week than I have in my life. I think that over the longue duree, a lot of technology shifts occur not because individuals gradually get convinced to move to the new technology, but because the folks clinging to the old ways eventually die out. (I'm paraphrasing Kuhn on paradigm change in science, of course.)

gaius 15y ago
I suspect that's not it, because we all grew up with videochat - they did it all the time on Star Trek! More seriously tho', I don't think it's wise to extrapolate from teenagers, because socially, they're not very sophisticated and don't have very long attention spans anyway. Grownups prefer much richer interactions that you need the whole spectrum of body language for (dropped frames in video calls misses this), intonation (poor audio in video calls misses this), ambience, the place you meet matters, and so on. That's why video calling is a solution looking for a problem.
- bittermang 15y ago
  We grew up with the idea of it. Not the widespread install base and ability to actually use it -- or as this suggests, to choose not use it very much at all.
- ugh 15y ago
  I don't understand. How do you connect your last sentence to what you wrote before? You seem to say that there are situations where video calls would be appropriate, there are, however, problems that make video chat not quite as good as face to face communication. Voilá, we just found the perfect niche for video chat: all those situations where face to face communication would be desirable but is impossible or too expensive. The technology is cheap and by now built into everything, let me just share this little anecdote: We regularly present the status of our bachelor's thesis to our Prof and one student couldn't attend in person so she just used video chat. The university didn't have to buy expensive equipment, we just used the projector that's standard in every meeting room and the Prof's old laptop with camera. It was not as good presenting face to face but far better than nothing at all or a telephone call. Nobody thought of video chat when building the infrastructure but now it's there and can be used at a moment's notice. This additional mode of communication crept up on us but now it's available and I think there are quite a few situations where its use is appropriate. (By far the minority but that's not really so important.)
snsr 15y ago
I think you've hit the nail on the head; my niece and nephews, teenagers and slightly younger, will hang out for hours with multiple video chat windows open.

gaius 15y ago

I suspect that's not it, because we all grew up with videochat - they did it all the time on Star Trek! More seriously tho', I don't think it's wise to extrapolate from teenagers, because socially, they're not very sophisticated and don't have very long attention spans anyway. Grownups prefer much richer interactions that you need the whole spectrum of body language for (dropped frames in video calls misses this), intonation (poor audio in video calls misses this), ambience, the place you meet matters, and so on. That's why video calling is a solution looking for a problem.

bittermang 15y ago
We grew up with the idea of it. Not the widespread install base and ability to actually use it -- or as this suggests, to choose not use it very much at all.
ugh 15y ago
I don't understand. How do you connect your last sentence to what you wrote before? You seem to say that there are situations where video calls would be appropriate, there are, however, problems that make video chat not quite as good as face to face communication. Voilá, we just found the perfect niche for video chat: all those situations where face to face communication would be desirable but is impossible or too expensive. The technology is cheap and by now built into everything, let me just share this little anecdote: We regularly present the status of our bachelor's thesis to our Prof and one student couldn't attend in person so she just used video chat. The university didn't have to buy expensive equipment, we just used the projector that's standard in every meeting room and the Prof's old laptop with camera. It was not as good presenting face to face but far better than nothing at all or a telephone call. Nobody thought of video chat when building the infrastructure but now it's there and can be used at a moment's notice. This additional mode of communication crept up on us but now it's available and I think there are quite a few situations where its use is appropriate. (By far the minority but that's not really so important.)

snsr 15y ago

I think you've hit the nail on the head; my niece and nephews, teenagers and slightly younger, will hang out for hours with multiple video chat windows open.