RE: Near-Term Scenarios (Was: A Future Timeline from Interactive Week)

Billy Brown (bbrown@conemsco.com)
Mon, 26 Apr 1999 15:24:42 -0500

GBurch1@aol.com wrote:
> Videophones are a function of bandwidth and compression tech. Just as
soon
> as the cable companies get a large enough installed base of high-speed net
> connections, this is going to happen -- why shouldn't it, with high-res
video
> cameras now in the sub-$200 range?

Actually, IMO there is a simple, non-technological reason why videophones will not emerge in the consumer market anytime soon: we don't want them. I'm not interested, no matter how cheap it is, and neither is anyone else that I know - and that includes a lot of techno-gadget addicts.

Businesses will want videophones for all sorts of good reasons - and they already have them, and the prices are falling just like you predict. Residential use will have to wait for a generation that doesn't mind answering the thing in a bathrobe, or (more likely) for an image-editing AI good enough that people won't be worrying about what they look like.

Billy Brown, MCSE+I
bbrown@conemsco.com